Peer to Peer Tutoring Program
Student Counseling and Support Service (SCSS) of UVT, with the support of UVT faculties, organizes every academic year the Peer to Peer Tutoring (P2PT) tutoring program in the West University of Timișoara, through which aims to offer UVT students in the first year of undergraduate studies educational assistance and career development services, with a focus on their integration into the university environment with the support of colleagues from older years.
Tutoring is a formal activity that aims to establish a relationship between a more experienced and informed person and a less experienced and informed one, the former having a supporting role and facilitating the personal and career development of the latter. Peer tutoring it is a particular form of tutoring, which is carried out "peer to peer", between people who belong to the same social group and hold a similar professional status. In university education, peer tutoring is a psychopedagogical intervention program in which older students provide academic and social support to younger students.
The general objective of the peer tutoring activity is to facilitate the learning and adaptation to the academic environment of the tutored students. Sthe cop implementation of the Peer to Peer Tutoring program in the Western University of Timișoara is to help the students in the first year of the bachelor's degree cycle to adjust more easily to the university environment, to provide them with useful information about the regulations and procedures present in UVT or at the faculty where they study, to help them adjust to life in the dormitory, to facilitate their communication with colleagues and teachers, to support their motivation for studies, to offer them support, to develop their independence in learning etc. This can provide freshmen with an easier transition from a pre-university school environment to a university environment, better adaptation to academic demands and autonomous student status, higher chances of academic performance, a lower risk of dropping out, personal development , harmonious social and professional – the prerequisites for the development of a successful career.
Brief description of the main actors involved in this program:
- The student-tutor: is a student at a bachelor's degree (year II, III, IV), master's or doctorate program who, within the program, on a voluntary basis, will tutor a group of between 5-30 students from the first year of the undergraduate studies. The student tutor is tasked with helping peers develop the personal and learning skills needed to meet their academic goals.
- The student tutor coordinator: is a student who has performed well in a previous tutoring program or other volunteer activities, has good academic results, has organizational/management skills and can coordinate and monitor the work of other student tutors.
- Tutored student: is the first-year student of the bachelor's degree cycle who benefits from specific peer-tutoring activities for a better adaptation to the academic environment and student life.
- The teaching staff responsible for the tutoring program at the faculty level: is a teacher appointed by the faculty management to ensure the smooth running of the tutoring and peer-tutoring program at the faculty level. He collaborates with the program coordinator from the Career Counseling and Guidance Center (CCOC), is involved in the selection process of student tutors, handles the distribution of lists of student tutors to year tutors and the final evaluation of student tutors and coordinators .
- Tutor of the year: is the teaching staff assigned to provide support and guidance to students in a certain year and university study program.
To be able to fulfill their roles properly, student-tutors and student-coordinators will need to develop certain basic skills, acquire certain knowledge, methods and means specific to the tutoring activity. In this sense, the Peer to Peer Tutoring (P2PT) Program has 5 training sessions: 4 initial training modules (1. Peer-tutoring. The role of the student tutor. Specific tasks, 2. Development of learning skills, 3. Development social skills, 4. UVT regulations and procedures) and a deepening development module (5. Specific peer-tutoring activities. Exercises and applications).
Carrying out individual and group tutoring activities, online communication with tutored students, offering support in solving administrative or social problems, facilitating social meetings between students are just some of the activities that student tutors will carry out in this program. Student tutor coordinators will support the development of these activities, monitor their implementation and mediate the connection with the CCOC coordinator.
The volunteer activity of the student-tutors will be periodically reported to the program coordinator of the UVT Career Counseling and Guidance Center. Both student-tutors and student-coordinators will prepare 2 evaluation reports. Given that they have carried out, until the end of the program, a total of at least 60 volunteer hours, they will be evaluated in the AI session by the teacher responsible for the program at the faculty/study program level. The evaluation of the activity of student tutors will be marked with the pass/fail qualification, according to Regulation regarding the granting of credits for volunteer activity in UVT. In terms of granting the qualification admis, student tutors will benefit from 2 additional transferable study credits, corresponding to the optional discipline Volunteering, included in the curriculum of all undergraduate and master's degree programs in UVT. The Peer to Peer Tutoring program takes place only in the first semester of the academic year. Also, students who have accumulated at least 60 hours of activity will benefit, at the end of the contract, from the issuance of a volunteer certificate.
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