New Job Tutoring

I’ve taken a job as a tutor at Johnson County Community College, and it’s been an eye-opening experience. The writing center is full of unique minds. There’s an Australian chap who wears his bluntness like a top hat, a student journalist, an actress-author-musician, and a Costa Rican guy who’s brains literally bulge out of his head. The slew of other tutors deserves mention, but I don’t work the same hours as they do. They’ve one thing in common—that they impressed our boss well enough to land the job.

And that’s all we have in common. Every single tutor there takes a completely different approach to tutoring (and to writing in general.) They were, at one point, listing off activities they do when writing. I was gazing into an alien universe. None of them write how I write; none of them even start writing the way I write. And to avoid being ego-centric, I’ll go on a limb and say that none of them write like each other.

This job has really opened my eyes. We’re all different and we’re all allowed to be different. It’s refreshing.

I taught an Ethiopian man (who is just beginning to study English) a mnemonic for spelling Christian, and I’m exceptionally proud to have thought of it. I told him to always start with C-H-R-I-S-T and then add an I-A-N, because Christ is in every Christian. It makes a bit more sense out loud, I think.