Volunteering experience - Mariannes story

Volunteering experience - Marianne's story Marianne L  is a registered tutor on Tutorfair who has recently volunteered with The Tutorfair Foundation! She has been a massive help by giving advice to students at a UCAS talk held at the PwC offices in London. Read Marianne's story below... Throughout my first Tutorfair volunteering event a single word kept coming to my mind â€" pluripotent. This term, which describes the capacity of stem cells to become almost any cells of almost any tissue or organ in the body, is the only word I could find to encapsulate the shear amount of potential present in a room filled with SEO scholars who are trying to decide which route to take for the next stage of their studies and how prepare themselves for a university education which could equip them for so many possible careers. Around 60 students (who will be going into Year 12 in September) attended the event during the summer holidays which was designed to help students prepare for University admissions by providing information about university league tables and UCAS points, together with advising on personal statements and discussing the transferable skills someone can gain from studying at the university level. We also talked about the numerous different routes a person could take to end up in a specific career (e.g. some of the different subjects studied by people who are currently members of parliament) and how common it is for someone to switch careers several times over their working life. One exercise that I found particularly interesting was trying to imagine what jobs children currently in primary school might be doing when they become adults â€" might some of these jobs be in fields that we have barely discovered yet? And what skills and subjects will become vital in the future? Might computer p rogramming be an essential skill as technology becomes a bigger part of everyday life or will artistic and creative subjects become more valuable as automation becomes able to take over from humans in roles where logic and calculation are required? The event did make me more aware of the increased obstacles current school students face, including the increased tuition fees and ever more competitive job market that awaits them after graduation. It also made me remember how difficult it can be to accurately predict exactly which subjects will be most useful to a specific degree course and a given career â€" I studied physics at university but I found the topics covered in further pure maths an absolutely invaluable addition to physics and now will be teaching a course to help students with these topics so they can excel on a physical science or engineering degree. However, it did also leave me incredibly heartened to spend time with  people who are only beginning an immensely rewarding and enjoyable phase of their lives and who really do have the potential to achieve and become so much. Want to give something back too? Get involved with The Tutorfair Foundation today!

How to Read Faster - Private Tutoring

How to Read Faster BobbiM Apr 21, 2014 Are you a slow reader? Would you like to increase your reading speed? Check out these helpful tips. -Choose high-interest material. It is best to push yourself to read faster with material that you are familiar with and enjoy. For example, if you like to read mystery novels, choose one to use for pushed reading. -Practice every day. To increase your reading rate, you will need to push yourself to read faster every day for 10 to 15 minutes. Use your local or school newspaper or anything that will sustain your interest for that amount of time. You might want to choose three or four brief articles and take a short break after each one. -Read at slightly-faster-than-comfortable-speeds. As you read, push yourself to read slightly faster than you usually do. You should feel a little uncomfortable reading at this speed and feel that you would prefer to slow down, but you should also sense that you understand what you are reading. -Check your comprehension. Increasing your reading rate while losing comprehension provides no benefit. Therefore, you need to check your comprehension of the material you are reading. However, because you are changing a habit, it is ok to have comprehension of only 70 to 80 percent of what you read during pushed reading. In fact, if you are having 100 percent comprehension you can probably push yourself to read faster. To check your comprehension, try to summarize the information. Did you identify all the key ideas? What about important details and examples? If you find that you are not comprehending the information, slow down a bit. -Try to read at the same time each day. Finding 15 minutes to read every day should not be much of a problem, but in order to keep an accurate record of your improvement you should try to find the time when you are most alert and try to read at that same time every day. -Dont give up. Improving your reading rate is a slow but steady process. You may make some great improvements one week then see little change the next. Dont worry about the fluctuations in your rate, as long as you are seeing an overall increase. However, if you find that you have gone several weeks without any improvement, make a conscious effort to push yourself even faster when you read. Excerpt from  College Success Strategies  by Sherrie L. Nist and Jodi Patrick Holschuh.