Tuesday, April 21, 2009

Are You A Tutoring Center?

I had a bit of a surreal moment just now. A man of indeterminable age called me. I answered with "XXXX Learning Center, how can I help you?" To which he responded "Are you a tutoring center?"
No, but I work in one, I thought as I responded in the affirmative.
"Ok, how much is it?" the disembodied voice asks.
Well, the tutoring center costs about $20,000 a month to run. "That depends on the program," I say. "Our prices can range from $30 to $100 an hour. Can you tell me what the student needs help with?"
"Math."
Well, that narrows it down. "Ok, can you be more speci--"
"Multiplication." Now the voice sounds angry....
"Right," I can't help it. I chuckle a little. "Well, that covers a pretty wide area. Can you tell me anything else? What grade level are we looking at? Are we talking about multiplication tables or binomials or what? Can you be any more specific?"
"No." Now the voice sounds disappointed.
"You don't know how old the student is?"
"18," barks the impatient voice. I now know that this is the voice of a young man who needs help for himself. Understanding achieved.
"Well, if you're just looking for the really basic stuff, like multiplication tables, then you're probably going to want to look online for flashcards and the like. If you just googled 'multiplication help' you'd probably find what you needed for free, as opposed to $50+ here."
"Ok." Click.

This happens way more often than you can imagine.

2 comments:

  1. Kinda reminds me of notalwaysright.org. But not quite as bad as their usual.

    Hi, Cranky, it's Deckard.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hey Deckard. Yeah, it's not that bad. It's just...odd. And irritating en masse.

    ReplyDelete

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