9 Common Misconceptions About Starting a Tutoring Business
So many educators are looking at and assessing their options as they consider moving out of the traditional classroom setting. Many are thinking about taking the leap into a private tutoring business. Before anyone takes that leap, they typically run through a slew of fears, mental roadblocks, and hurdles.
In our experience, we’ve observed that these fears are often based on myths and misconceptions. In all honesty, before we took the leap to leave the classroom and establish our private tutoring practices, we had some of the same fears. Now that we’re on the other side, we can share that these fears were completely unfounded.
Now, let’s take a closer look at some of the most common of these myths and misconceptions and bust them wide open!
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Here are 9 Common Misconceptions about Launching and Running a Tutoring Business:
1. Tutoring is NOT profitable.
From experience, tutoring absolutely CAN be profitable. However, you have to plan to be profitable. Money won’t just roll in without you first putting in the work to establish a profitable business.
Simply put, profitability as a tutor takes planning. You can’t just wing it.
2. You need to leave the classroom to benefit from having a Tutoring Business.
This is not a one-thing or-the-other situation. You do not need to leave the classroom in order to start a private tutoring practice.
There are plenty of private practice tutors who have never and never plan to leave the classroom. Leaving the classroom is not the goal of their business and, instead, they have different goals for their business.
3. It’s better/easier to just work for a tutoring agency.
Many people think that the only path to tutoring is working with a tutoring agency like, say, Sylvan Learning. Yes, you absolutely could work for a tutoring agency. However, you won’t earn as much and you won’t have as much freedom.
There is not just one right way to become a tutor.
4. Teachers should willingly give their services for free.
This misconception comes up so often and we have a lot of feelings about it!
Teachers are very giving and caring people by nature. They deserve to be respected and compensated for their time.
5. No one will pay for your private services.
Some question why anyone would pay for private services when school is free. If you think about it, are schools able to offer everything that a private tutoring service can do in a 1:1 session? It’s easy to see how the answer here is a big NO! For that reason, many people are very willing to pay for private tutoring services.
6. Teachers aren’t good at business.
We wholeheartedly disagree with this common misconception. Teachers absolutely are good at business! While teachers are gentle and caring, we also have a whole set of skills in our toolbelts that allow us to easily slip into a successful business mindset.
Think about skills like classroom management. These skills translate directly to being able to run a successful business. The things you are able to do efficiently in your classroom, cross over to being able to set systems, procedures, and policies in your business.
Read, CAN TEACHERS BE SUCCESSFUL BUSINESS OWNERS? WE THINK SO! to find out more!
7. Only children need tutors.
There is definitely a need for adult tutoring services!
Many educators find that they LOVE working with adults. There are many opportunities out there to work with adults as well as children as a tutor with a private practice. We know tutors who work with adults learning English as a second language, adults in the prison system, and adults who grew up with a reading disability but never received the appropriate interventions.
8. Tutoring was only necessary during the pandemic.
Sure many private tutoring practices took off during the pandemic, but there were a lot of factors at play there. There has always been and there will always be a need for tutoring. Some may argue that, as a result of disruptions during the pandemic, students need private tutors now more than ever!
9. There aren’t enough students who need tutoring.
This misconception comes from an outdated idea that all students can fit in the same box. The idea that a student may just need more homework or help on tests when in actuality, they need more support in the form of tutoring.
In reality, more students need tutoring now than ever before. Just look at the data on national reading scores and all of the research coming out about the Science of Reading. There are plenty of different scenarios where families are seeking qualified tutors to help their children.
For every single one of those misconceptions, we know multiple educators who are, every day, proving it wrong! We personally know educators who have obliterated each one of those misconceptions and continue to.
The beautiful thing about starting a private tutoring practice or education business is that you get to set the parameters, you get to decide what it looks like and how it works for you.
When you launch your own tutoring business, there are no rules!
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