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Weekly Tutorials

During these tutorials you can focus on writing, speaking or both and:

• Set a personalized agenda with clearly determined goals specifically designed for your needs.
• Reduce your accent and improve your intonation and pronunciation.
• Learn about idioms, slang, and American culture.
• Sharpen your writing skills by learning to develop your argument, test your evidence, and revise for clarity.
• Understand what your professor really expects in an essay and how American writing conventions differ from what you have been taught at home.

Our graduate student tutors are experienced teachers who are familiar with the cross-cultural issues that make writing and speaking in academic English a challenge. Students often find that their tutors also serve as cultural guides, offering resources to help their students navigate the unfamiliar academic landscape. They can also help you locate research sources and decipher the particularities of citation and documentation. If you are a teaching fellow, they will offer you practice sessions in giving effective presentations.

To request a tutorial and sign up for an intake interview, please contact Director Nancy Nies. Once you are assigned a tutor, you are expected to show up each week. If you think you might only need occasional help with your writing, please make an appointment with the Writing Center consultants in the library instead. They offer both weekly appointments and a drop-in service with their consultants.