Did you know that UAB offers FREE tutoring to undergraduate students in many of their core classes? The Vulcan Materials Academic Success Center (VMASC) is located in the Education Building (EB 240) and is staffed with a team of professionals dedicated to supporting students in their academic success. Two services that the VMASC coordinates for students are tutoring and supplemental instruction, or as the students call it SI. Students may log on to the VMASC website and register for individualized tutoring. Tutoring is designed so that one student meets with one tutor within a study space in the VMASC. All tutors have displayed mastery of the subjects for which they tutor and have faculty references and are required to attending training.
On the other hand, Supplemental Instruction are group learning sessions that are held for specific courses on a regular schedule. Peers who have proven mastery of the content within a course teams up with a faculty member to develop on-time content focused review and study sessions for students. The students who lead SI sessions also attend the course at the same time as the students they lead through content review; therefore, the SI Leader is aware of how the professor explained the materials, in-class examples, and other details of the classroom learning environment which allows them to have a shared perspective and sets the stage for more focused review sessions.
The month of September is the time with your students are likely to begin to feel like they are developing a routine. Please encourage them to add tutoring and SI to their routine – even before they think they need it. Remind them that it is smart to invest some time now to make certain they learn the materials for their courses and set up a strong GPA rather than lose all of their time in the future trying to “make-up” for less than desired performances. If you have any questions regarding these or other services provided by the VMASC, please visit the website at: http://www.uab.edu/students/academics/student-