With impending finals, students at the University of Maine might find themselves looking for academic assistance. While some prefer to use Quizlet or a study group, there are also resources on campus meant to help students. One such resource is Knack Tutoring , a program that offers free tutoring sessions covering a diverse range of subjects to UMaine students.
Knack Tutoring is a service that works alongside the University with the goal of strengthening the peer learning community on campus. To get involved in the program, students must submit a tutoring request on the Knack website, review the qualified tutors to find the one that best suits their needs and then schedule an appointment.
According to Associate Director at the Office of Student Academic Success and Knack Tutoring point of contact, Mary Beth Willett, the tutoring platform has seen an increase in popularity throughout recent years.
“The first semester of utilizing the Knack platform was at the beginning of Fall 2023. We have seen an increase in usage by 1000 hours for the Fall 2024 semester compared to Fall 2023. We have hit many milestones this year for record hours of tutoring, record number of tutors and also record number of students being tutored,” said Willett. “UMaine and Knack create the benchmarks and we have surpassed them all.”
There is also a Knack Tutoring app for further convenience, which has steadily gained traction.
“Students appreciate the convenience of having an app on their phone and scheduling a session with a tutor that works for them. They also like the ability to choose a tutor, make additional session appointments or have a group tutoring session. Tutors like the flexibility of choosing which courses they will tutor and choosing when they will accept sessions that fit with their academic schedule. Faculty appreciate that they have access to the Knack course search feature, where they can search tutors for their course(s),” said Willett.
Statistics show that 86.5% of tutoring sessions through Knack take place in person, with 13.5% taking place online. Recently, about 3,655 students regularly use Knack with the help of 177 available tutors. While some students might be hesitant to use the app due to requiring help in a niche course, the program provides services for 557 different classes. Of those courses, Willett admitted that there are certain classes that consistently stay in higher demand.
“True to tutoring demand in the past at UMaine, our highest demand subject areas are Physics, Math, Statistics, Biology and Chemistry,” said Willett.
If a student is interested in getting involved in tutoring but cannot find a tutor in their course, they are encouraged to email um.osas@maine.edu, call (207) 581-2351 or stop by the tutoring offices in 104 Dunn Hall where a staff member will add that course to their recruitment list.
Tutoring is available during the Fall and Spring semesters as well as during Winter and Summer sessions.The location of in-person tutoring sessions is determined by the student and their assigned tutor. Typically, tutoring sessions are held on campus in a common area such as the library, a study lounge, or a classroom. The only locations that are off–limits include dorm rooms and off-campus residences. Most sessions, both in–person and online, typically last between 30 – 90 minutes depending on the student‘s preferences.
In light of finals being around the corner, some students may also be curious about how many tutoring sessions they can request in a week. As of right now, students are permitted to receive tutoring for up to three hours per week for each course, with this maximum resetting every Sunday.
