I work as an English tutor through my University - I specifically tutor Composition I and II (i.e. “Freshman English”) – a former tutee/student of mine from last year has contacted me asking if I can tutor her privately on certain writing assignments (since she is no longer a Freshman taking first-year Comp) – I have yet to reply to the email because I don’t really know anything about private tutoring rates. She will be paying me out of pocket.
Through my school, I make 12 dollars an hour. I’m more qualified than the average undergraduate when it comes to tutoring English because I’ve taken a couple of graduate seminars centered around composition pedagogy and I have a little over a year’s worth of experience, but I’m not as qualified as someone who actually has a BA/MA in English (as many private tutors do.) As far as rates go, I’ve read about everything from 10 to 80 dollars an hour. I don’t want to overcharge this student but I also don’t want to sell myself (or my services) short. I’ve worked with her extensively before (weekly sessions through two semesters) so her contacting me indicates that she’s satisfied with my work.
@AboutTheSame - Sorry, I wasn’t exactly clear on what the assignments are - they aren’t course assignments, they’re transfer application essays. So this is entirely outside of the confines of our school - 100% private.
Very good. Re pricing, maybe think about how much time you would expect to spend based on your past work with her and make a guess at what a good essay would be worth to her?
$10 - $80 is a wide spread. I’d recommend doing some additional research to determine the prevailing wage, and go that route. It’s likely to be around $50/hour. That said, if she is a big financial aid recipient, you could use a sliding fee scale and charge less, if you want to.
$36 for an undergrad? That seems awfully high. I investigated this when I was wondering if my kid could make much money tutoring and learned that in our area, the going rate for certified, experienced teachers or PhD’s is $30-50/hr.
Have never hired an English tutor, but have paid for lots of instrumental music (piano, flute, saxophone, clarinet, bassoon) over the years. These have mostly been professional music teachers, and the least we ever paid was $12.50 for a half hour lesson, and have paid as much as $35.00 for a hour lesson. It would seem like charging within a similar range for English tutoring would be reasonable.
You need to balance the hourly charge vs. number of customers.
That is, you could charge $50/hr but only get one customer, or charge $20 and get 4 customers.
Also, you might start with a lower hourly charge until you get success…“The last 4 of my clients successfully transferred”.