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Sylvan Learning Centers  are just one of many tutoring firms that provide services for schools and  individual families. www.educate.com 888-EDUCATE Score!  is another company that not only provides tutoring but also additonal support for parents through their website www.Escore.com 888-ESCORE-4 The Huntington Learning Centers were started in California.   There are many throughout the country. www.huntingtonlearning.com Be sure to check out past issues of Parent Power! at www.edreform.com to find out whether your child’s needs are the result of flaws in a school’s program.  Or call us for a Parent Power! Pack that will give you the tips and resources you need to stay on top of your child’s education day in and day out. T oday there seems to be a tutor to fit every student, including those who previously didn’t need them. There is a rising concern among many parents that schools across the country are failing in their duties to groom students in the classroom. Parents are now turning to tutors to teach academic skills generally learned in school. Overcrowding, not enough teachers and economics are usually cited as the reasons your everyday students don’t do well in the classroom.  But children who used to endure are now failing to learn the basics. Those parents who don’t have the time or talent needed to educate their chil- dren after school are shopping around for tutors instead. There will always be students deficient in remedial skills who need a learning center equipped with qualified teachers who provide appro- priate instruction. And parents who have children with learning disabilities can call upon special schools that have trained tutors to address specific problems.  Even students from wealthy back- grounds who have a bright track record in the classroom but are worried about standard- ized testing can find tutors specializing in test-taking skills. This growing need for tutors by average students that has evolved recently is alarming and problematic. Until some solutions are devel- oped to ensure that children are getting the academic skills normally learned in the class- room, tutors may fit the bill for those who can afford them. Other members of the education community, such as Richard Bavaria, Vice President for Education for Sylvan Learning Centers in Baltimore, Maryland, confirm this. “Tutoring works.  We’ve known that ever since Plato tutored Aristotle.” Sixty percent of the students who come to Sylvan Learning Centers are from elementary and middle schools, seeking help in reading to either correct defi- cient skills or improve upon skills just to get ahead. About 25 to 30 percent attend for math instruction and the rest come for study skills, writing and enrichment. “It’s no different than sending your child to piano lessons,”  Bavaria said, explaining that the student to teacher ratio is usually no more than three per tutor. “No one can drift away.  You have to focus.” In addition to traditional tutoring, where students come to Sylvan Centers to learn for about $40 and hour, Bavaria said that centers are set up in inner city schools throughout the country.  They are gover- ment subsidized, which enables Sylvan to offer first- rate tutoring to needy children for free during the school year. Not long ago in Long Island, New York, it was reported by the New York Times that in summer affluent families hire tutors from Princeton Review — a firm that specializes in enhancing students’ test–taking skills. Tutors are often thirty–some- thing aspiring artists who venture to the Hamptons for the summer to help students prepare for tests like the SAT. These test-preparation tutors are paid $300 an hour by New York’s elite, as they want their children to attend intensely competitive Ivy League colleges. The Princeton Review, founded in 1981, says that students tutored to learn their test-taking tricks can increase their SAT score by 120 points combined. Not everyone can afford these types of tutors, espe- cially students with learning disabilities from low income families. But special schools like the Lab School of Washington, D.C., offer tutors who are trained to address learning deficiencies at an affordable price. “[We] address whatever works best for each situation,” says Peggy Fleury, Assistant to the Director of Tutoring for the Lab School. “We conduct a ‘diagnostic prescriptive’ look at what the students’ prob- lems are and then we address those needs.” Learning disability tutors for the Lab School spend an entire year in the classroom learning the latest teaching methods and how to apply them on a case-by-case basis. “We teach people how to read, phonics and visual memory. We are constantly [updating our] methods, because we’re working with kids whose lives are on the line,” says Fleury. While specialized tutoring will always be in need, there is growing concern that the dramatic increase in tutoring — from companies on the ground like Sylvan to those in cyber- space like tutor.com — is a result of alarming and increasing deficiencies in even the best public schools. Parents considering supple- mental educational services for their children might want to re- examine why they are in that position. Schools that might be lacking academically might lurk behind the tutor-prone child. Why Do Parents Pay Tutors?