Sometimes its worth reflecting on what you really do as a company and why.
Athena Tuition has been around now since 2013, and we think that by now we know what it takes to run a tutoring agency!
But for everyone’s clarity, and even our own – what is it that we really do?
Fundamentally, Athena Tuition is a tutoring agency, (or tuition agency depending on what some people might call it). On a day-to-day basis, people call or email us looking for a good private tutor for themselves or their child, while separately tutors seek to join our books as available private tutors, finding work through us, simplifying their admin and bolstering their credibility by joining a reputable agency.
Essentially then, we’re middlemen. Simplifying, improving and speeding up the process of connecting student to tutor. But why do such services even exist you might ask? Why don’t people just go direct and find a tutor?
Both good questions- and the internet has made it easier in many ways for people to find a tutor. Historically, people found tutors through word of mouth or local notice boards, but since the internet has become widespread, you can easily find sites with lists of tutors who tout their services directly. For some who are willing to wade through choices and who feel equipped to be a good judge of character and tutoring ability this might be where they find their ideal tutor.
However, for anyone who wants to find an especially good match for their son or daughter and doesn’t want to take any shortcuts, it often makes sense to call professionals who deal with tutors and tutoring on an everyday basis. This is where we as a tutor agency step in: a client tells us what exactly they’re looking for in any amount of detail and then we go and do the legwork searching, sourcing and negotiating with tutors to find the right match. We have already done the backend work to ensure tutors have the right DBS checks, references, positive demeanour, proven experience and prior successful results to make us feel they will go on to provide an excellent service for that student.
Given that it works with tutors week-in and week-out, a tutoring agency develops experience with tutors, students and results that just can’t be matched by a typical parent who may only ever look for and deal with tutors a few times in their life.
What an agency offers to tutors on the other hand, is a trusted, filtered and high-quality source of new opportunities to work with students in whatever subject and level they specialise with, and a platform which automates some of the admin drudgery that they would otherwise be forced to do. We’ve had tutors in the past bring clients they found in person to work with through our agency as they preferred to keep proceedings professional and efficient, which we always find heartening!
Ultimately Athena Tuition knows what it is that we do fundamentally, and we hope to continue to be able to provide these services to many more parents, students and tutors for many years to come. Sometimes though, it’s just worth restating for our own benefit, and anyone else out there who is curious!
By Wesley Sanders- Director of Athena Tuition