How TMU students are making a difference through tutoring and mentorship
Since the program began, four TMU student tutors have tutored 22 high school students over 85 sessions.
When second-year chemical engineering student Fred Mammah moved from Nigeria to Toronto to pursue his university degree, he knew he wanted to find a way to give back to the community. Having tutored primary school children while in high school, a community tutoring program through TMU felt like a natural fit.
Launched in January 2023, P2E x TMU Community Tutoring is a collaboration between the Pathways to Education program at Regent Park Community Health Centre (external link) and the Student Life and Learning Support unit at TMU.
Through this collaboration, Mammah and three other TMU undergraduate student tutors provided academic tutoring and mentoring over the winter semester to students in grades nine through 12 from the Regent Park neighbourhood.
Building bridges to higher education
A goal of the program, says Krystal Valentine, manager of student learning and academic engagement at TMU, was to provide TMU students from equity-deserving backgrounds the opportunity to support and mentor students from similar backgrounds who typically face barriers to accessing post-secondary education.
Every week from January to June, the TMU tutors facilitated one-on-one and group tutoring sessions on STEM subjects that are required for admission into post-secondary programs. They helped to clarify and review concepts, explained processes and guided the students through problem-solving strategies.
Emily Reddon, a youth worker and program facilitator at Regent Park Community Health Centre, says that having a tutor who was just a few years older than the high schoolers had a big impact on their comfort level and helped to create a safe space. “It can be really intimidating for teenagers to sit down one-on-one with a new adult to get help with something that's already hard and that they don’t understand.”
"For me, what I found most rewarding was the joy that came from doing something valuable for a student. Once they understood a concept that they were struggling with, it was really nice to know that I helped them overcome it."
“For some of our students, it can sometimes feel like there is a big gap between where they are now and getting to university,” says Reddon. “It’s programs like these that help to close that gap.”
From tutors to role models
Emily Reddon (second from left) from Regent Park Community Health Centre with the four TMU student tutors: From left to right, Saeideh Alizadeh, Mathematics and Its Applications `23, Khalid Abdurahman, Mechanical Engineering Ashton Singh, Financial Mathematics and Fred Mammah, Chemical Engineering.
In addition to providing academic support, the program also gave the tutors the opportunity to talk with the students about going to university, including hosting 31 students from the Regent Park community at the SLC for a “day in the life” student experience program. The tutors helped to organize and lead interactive activities, campus tours and panel discussions that allowed the high school students to ask questions and get real-time feedback and resources about getting a higher education.
Coming from similar backgrounds, the TMU tutors were uniquely positioned to share their personal university experiences and represent a promising and attainable future.
“Our students could see themselves in the tutors,” said Reddon. “They looked up to them and saw them as role models and as young people who were on a path that was achievable for them too.”
Choosing TMU
With the help of this program, and given the university’s proximity to the Regent Park community, TMU is seen as a top university choice for graduating students in the area. This coming fall, 10 students who were directly involved in the program or engaged with the Student Life and Learning team are coming to TMU to pursue their post-secondary education.
“TMU has a very diverse student body, which reflects the community that our students grew up in here in Regent Park,” said Reddon. “The hope is that young people in our area can see how university can be an inclusive place and they're going to be welcomed and represented.”
The tutoring program will start again in September with more tutors being hired and trained throughout the summer. “I would encourage other students to consider becoming a tutor,” said Mammah. “It was a very rewarding experience.”
If you are a current TMU undergraduate student and are interested in tutoring opportunities, reach out to Cleopatra Myers, peer learning support facilitator at cleopatra.myers@torontomu.ca.