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Any student worried about keeping up with the rigorous workload of UCLA classes should have no problem getting some extra help from the various tutoring services offered on campus.

In addition to class and subject-specific tutoring offered by individual departments and private tutors, two major tutoring services – the Academic Advancement Program tutoring and Covel tutorials – have been helping UCLA students succeed for over 20 years.  

AAP offers tutoring for over 450 classes and is free for all AAP students. The program is divided into three labs – science, social science and humanities.

At the start of each quarter AAP students can sign up at Campbell Hall, where all tutoring takes place, said Reggie Waddell, English and humanities lab coordinator.

Waddell said AAP tutoring is conducted by standing appointments, not on a walk-in basis. Once signed up, the student has made a commitment to attend tutoring sessions once a week for 11 weeks.

His lab offers about 51 courses and over 500 students attend each quarter.

The tutors are all UCLA students and must interview for the program. Waddell said for his lab, it is preferred that the tutors have taken the class for which they will be tutoring.

AAP fall training teaches tutors how to engage students in discussion and debate applicable to their actual classes.

“It’s not about ‘I have the answers and you don’t,’” Waddell said, adding that encouragement, support and respect are three main tools tutors bring to each session.

AAP tutors are required to visit the professor of the class they are tutoring to learn how to best help AAP students taking their class.

Waddell said tutoring broadens students’ perspective and offers a diversity of information that they won’t get on their own.

“The benefits are obvious in terms of critical thinking, and that’s what college is all about,” he said.

Ed Frankel, assistant director of Covel tutorials, shares Waddell’s feelings on tutoring. He has worked with Covel tutorials since 1980 when it first started as part of the English department, with a focus on writing programs.

The idea was to create peer tutoring to give students a chance to process information for themselves, and this focus has not changed over the years, Frankel said, though the program is now under the College of Letters & Science.

Frankel said tutoring is valuable because “it gives us distance in our writing.” He said writing is often viewed as a solitary act, when it is really a collaborative effort.

Currently, Covel tutorials offers tutoring in all subjects for student athletes, and free math and science, composition, or ESL tutoring for all UCLA students.

There are 30 undergraduate tutors for the math and science program, each working with about eight students at a time, and running five to six groups. Students sign up in Covel Commons during the first week of classes for tutoring in a specific introductory math or science class, and usually get their first pick, Frankel said.

Students can also schedule a composition tutorial anytime during the quarter, meeting one-on-one with a tutor to discuss a paper. Conducted by graduate students, ESL tutoring helps students write or speak English as a second language, and is available by appointment throughout the quarter.

Drop-in appointments for all three types of tutoring are available between 5 p.m. and 7 p.m., Monday through Thursday.

While budget cuts will affect both AAP and Covel tutorials, Frankel said it is nothing major, and Waddell added that if anything, cuts might affect the number of classes and tutors offered.

For more information visit www.college.ucla.edu/up/ct/ or www.college.ucla.edu/up/aap/tutoring/index.html.