The Altoona Public Library is offering tutor.com, a free tutoring program for all students with a library card. 

“There is a Google form embedded in the tutor.com information sheet that I sent to teachers… and then the public library will process your card and will send them an electronic number, and that’s the number you’ll need to enter into tutor.com. [The library] will also get them a physical library card to me, and then I get it to the student in reporting room,” Library Media Specialist Tanya Lucas said.

Tutoring will only be done for a couple hours after school.

“You can connect with a tutor, but it’s only between the hours of 3 p.m. and 10 p.m.,” Lucas said

While there are study resources for all subjects, students can only connect with a tutor for science, technology, engineering and mathematics. There is also much more content for these STEM subjects.

“There are tests and worksheets, learning games and flashcards,” Lucas said. “But this really is geared toward STEM, to help kids with STEM.”

“I went on there and found there were different headings, there were different AP courses, different math courses and a ton of different STEM courses, so you had to find your category, or you were out of luck,” junior Cassidy Klock said.

However, there are resources for other tests too.

“There is also prep for SAT and ACT and grad school tests… there’s general tips and tricks for taking the test, and there is a wide variety of tests, even to become a U.S. citizen,” Lucas said.

Tutoring is done using a screen share function instead of a Zoom call.

“It’s not face-to-face, but it’s screen-to-screen, so you’ll be able to share your computer screen with them. It’s like a platform similar to Jamboard,” Lucas said.

Klock explained how helpful the tutoring has been.

“Being able to talk to somebody is always something that helps me more,” Klock said. “Instead of trying to learn off a book or something like that, being able to ask them questions live is definitely helpful… there’s definitely been an increase on how much I understand something.”