The Mutual Benefits of Community Tutoring

Abstract

As one of the most immersive components of my study abroad semester in Ireland, I spent one evening each week with the Study Buddies Program of the Dublin separated Children’s Service. Through this organization that provides tutoring to refugees and asylumseekers, I worked with two African students in their early twenties on subjects including chemistry, biology, and home economics. We reviewed material taught in class, often with a focus on the struggles that arise during study in a nonnative language. Through this program, I experienced the dramatic benefits such programs can provide to both students and tutors. Upon reflection I began to understand this type of interaction as a robust remedy for many of the challenges often internally cited as most pressing in my home country of the United States, such as fragmentation and polarization of groups, xenophobia, and general lagging educational achievement. I believe that tutoring can foster qualities in participants that promote opposite,
positive trends in social dynamics and education.