I’m A Tutor… Get Me Out Of Here

(STUDENT/TUTOR LIFE)

- Words, Ben Revi.

I was offered my first teaching job at the wise old age of twenty-two. It was a fairly inauspicious introduction to the world of academic work. At the time, I was six months into my doctoral studies, and I had to complete my first major review. I was asked, as I later found out everyone was, if I’d considered using feminist approaches in my work. Then I was asked if I wanted to be a tutor the following semester.

The first tutorial was a bizarre experience. I walked in, uncharacteristically early, and had no idea what to do. In a fit of contrived recklessness, I decided to sit on a table. I waited until everyone was seated. Then the silence hit me. I realised that nothing at all would happen until I said something. I tried to calmly introduce myself – I’m sure from the outside I must’ve sounded like I was yelping. I asked everyone in the class to introduce themselves, realising immediately that there was no way anyone’s name was ever going to stick to me. I was frightened – I was no older than most of my students, and I knew I couldn’t outsmart them. I tried to fill the next two hours with whatever theory came to mind. When time was up, I ran.

Over the weeks, I became a lot less anxious about teaching. I realised that the few extra years I’d spent reading piles of obscure rubbish had perfectly prepared me for the job of trying to translate the obscure rubbish my students had to read into some form of actual English. I began to mark essays, and was genuinely pleasantly surprised by some of them. (Some.) I think it worked out okay, in the end.

Some years later, I’m still tutoring. I’m also trying to actually finish my PhD thesis. In five hours, I’ll be taking the first of four consecutive classes – I don’t get much sleep anymore. But I do get the benefit of having stayed in this little sheltered university world my entire adult life, which I figure is a bonus. I get to keep meeting interesting people who want to make some sort of difference. And hell, I still get to keep reading their words in the student newspaper.

Most students don’t understand how important On Dit is. It should be a creative outlet. It should be a forum for would-be writers, artists, illustrators, photographers and designers to offer something to the people around them, and for the rest of us to be inspired by their work. University should never, ever be about qualifications and job specifications. This is the one time in our lives where we can explore, make mistakes, flirt with the dangerous side of sanity, drink too much, say foolish things, question the basis of our very existence, then write about it all and get published. We can think whatever we like and argue with whoever stands in our path.

Plus, writing for On Dit will improve your essays. I guarantee it.