With only a few weeks left until school starts, the tutoring business is gearing up. And it is one industry in America that seems immune to recession. More parents are paying for tutors for their children
According to Steve Pines, executive director of the Education Industry Association, spending on tutors is growing at more than 5 percent a year. This is down from yearly growth of 8 to 10 percent in 2007, when the education research firm EduVentures estimated the size of the tutoring industry at $5 billion to $7 billion a year. But it is still strong, given the state of most people’s personal finances. And Sandi Ayaz, executive director of the National Tutoring Association, said the number of tutors her organization had certified had grown 18 percent in each of the last five years.
While tutors once focused on helping children who were falling behind in particular subjects or had a learning disability, they are now being used far more to guide students through particularly tough courses, insure their grades are equal to or above their peers’ and, in the end, polish a child’s college application.

People have been pulling back for tutors charging $250 to $400 an hour,” said Sandy Bass, editor and publisher of Private School Insider, an online newsletter. “They’re still using tutors, but they’re searching around for more reasonably priced help. In Manhattan, $85 to $150 is the acceptable range for reasonably priced.”

Mr. Pines of the Education Industry Association said he had seen the same reassessment in the rest of the country, where the average rate was $45 to $65 an hour. Parents who once would have had in-home tutors are going to tutoring centers, while some using the centers have cut back on hours or moved to online-only platforms. He said a rising player in this field is www.HelpWithAssignment.com, an online education company, that charges $90.00 a month for help on an Internet platform.
HWA provides seamless online tuitions in sessions of 30 minutes, 60 minutes or 120 minutes covering a variety of subjects. The specialty of HWA online tuitions are:

• Conducted by experts in the subject taught
• Tutors selected after rigorous assessment and training
• Tutoring sessions follow a pre-decided structure based on instructional design best practices
• State-of-the art technology used