At MyTutor, we’ve been impressed and inspired by the lengths our tutors go to every day to help their students. Anyone who’s experienced a MyTutor lesson (or peered over the shoulder of someone who’s having one) knows it’s about much more than just improving grades. Our tutors help students believe in themselves, enjoy their learning and achieve what they’re capable of – in the classroom, in the exam hall and in life.
To reward some of our best tutoring talent each year, and give a tiny glimpse of the MyTutor magic that goes on every day, we ask parents and students to nominate their favourite tutor for one of three awards. These are the Best Confidence Booster, Best Mentor and Best Success Story. Keep reading to see how we picked our three winners, and how they each changed their students’ lives this year.
From 400 down to 3
In August we asked MyTutor parents and students to nominate their tutor, and we didn’t have to ask twice! Hundreds of nominations came rushing in, each with a heartfelt written nomination about how their tutor had impacted them or their child. In the MyTutor office, with tissues at the ready, we read through each and every nomination and carefully narrowed the list down to just 15 – 5 in each category. There were so many touching stories, but we had to make a choice.
With our shortlist of 15, we brought in a steely-eyed judging panel to pick our final winners. Each member of our panel brought their own unique perspective from the world of education to the table, and now we’re excited to announce to you our final three winners.
Here are winners of the tutor awards 2022, and how they changed their students’ lives this year.
Best Mentor
At MyTutor, our tutors are much more than grades-boosters. Because they’re all current students or recent grads from UK universities, they’re just a few years ahead in their education compared to teens. This means that as well as having the subject and exam knowledge needed to give great lessons, they also double up as role models and mentors to their students. They explain things in a way kids understand, and they can share their own GCSE, A Level and university application experience to help them through their educational journeys.
There were nearly 200 entries for this prize, which says just how many of our tutors help their students in this way. From our nominations and shortlist, we’re happy to announce that Victor U is this year’s winner of the Best Mentor prize! Victor is a Philosophy, Politics and Economics student at the University of Warwick and he tutors Economics. He was nominated for the impact he had on his student Baha in A-Level Economics.
Here’s what his student’s dad, Zahir, had to say:
“My son struggles with dyslexia. Since starting at secondary school, he has always placed in the bottom sets. The school’s expectations, we felt, were really low. After a year of getting U grades in school, we decided to do something about it. After a false start, he started having lessons with Victor. The change in his behaviour and motivation was clear after just a few weeks. His confidence started to grow. The lessons were interactive, so that my son had to actively participate, not just listen. He had this newfound confidence and even put in his UCAS application that he would outperform his predicted grades. And with Victor’s capable mentoring and tutoring, that is exactly what he did. He exceeded his predicted grades and got into his first-choice university to study law! A great achievement for someone who was used to getting U grades. But, probably the greatest change since he started tutoring has been in his confidence, discipline, and high aspiration. Thank you so much Victor– deeply appreciated.”
We haven’t worked out how to clone our tutors just yet, but until then, congratulations Victor!
Best Confidence Booster
As well as being powerful role models for their students, one of the biggest impacts our tutors have is in building up their confidence. That’s the thing about 1-1 learning – there’s no embarrassment about not getting something the first time, and students can ask as many questions as they like and go over tricky topics as many times as they need until they’ve got it nailed. Our tutors know that by encouraging their students every step of the way, celebrating their small and big wins, and encouraging them as individuals, they can achieve their full potential.
We had hundreds of nominations in this category, and it took a lot of careful judging to narrow them down to just one winner, but here we go. This year’s winning tutor of the Best Confidence Booster is Danielle J! Danielle studies English at University College London, and she tutors English Language and Literature, Psychology and Biology.
Here’s what her student Eva had to say:
“Danielle not only helped me improve my skills in English, but she’s also helped bring back my love and passion for the subject. It had been my favourite subject before I had lost my spark for it. On top of this, she was extremely friendly which made our sessions light-hearted and judgement-free– the ideal environment to learn in. My mom also had a very positive experience with Danielle since she would always receive detailed and constructive feedback from her after every session. Danielle is the best tutor I’ve had and was genuinely invested in my success, which made me gain confidence in my own abilities.”
Congratulations Danielle!
Best Success Story
With a bit of confidence and a role model, our tutors get amazing results on paper too. The combination of mentoring, confidence-boosting and our tutors’ relevant expertise is a powerful recipe for academic success – whether that’s getting over the pass line, or pushing results up to a 9 or an A. MyTutor students improve, on average, by a whole grade in 12 lessons – and it’s often a lot more than that.
We saw some incredible turnaround stories from this year’s nominations, which makes the winner in this category even more impressive. We’re happy to announce that this year’s winner of the Best Success Story awards is Geography and Geology tutor Ruby D! Ruby is currently studying for an Integrated Masters in Earth Science at Durham University. She helped her student Daniel get back on track with his A-Levels and secure a place at his first choice uni! Here’s what Daniel’s mum Lynn had to say:
“My son has severe dyspraxia and was struggling with his A-levels. His college was reluctant to help and even suggested he drop out. Daniel really didn’t want to do this as knew he could make it with the right help. But he didn’t know where to turn. We contacted MyTutor and Ruby has tutored him for Geography and Geology. In terms of grades, Dan has received: A,A,B today and is off to his first-choice university. He could not have done this without Ruby.”
A huge congratulations again to each of our winning tutors. We’d also like to say a huge thank you to every tutor who inspired, motivated, mentored and encouraged their students this year – you’re all absolute legends.
If you’d like to find a tutor like Victor, Danielle or Ruby for your child, give us a call on 0203 773 6024 or email support@mytutor.co.uk, and we’ll help you find the perfect match.