Lucy’s story

Lucy talks about how Inspiration Education has shaped her life today.

Hear Lucy’s story:

“I struggled with confidence and pushing myself a lot with pressure”

As a teenager, Lucy set high expectations for herself. She started getting some help with schoolwork from a family friend, who supervised her homework but didn’t really tackle any of the root problems that were causing her stress at school. “[The tutor] was great, and I did quite well. But we were very content-focused, sort of ‘what did you do this week?’ As a student, I really struggled both in confidence of my grades and also pushing myself a lot with pressure.”

She heard about Inspiration Education through a friend who’d received tuition from us before. With her eyes on top scholar, Lucy thought Inspiration Education would be a good way to have “back up” to school, so that she could reach her goals.

“I actually trust this person with my education this year”

Lucy signed up with tutoring from Inspiration Education, and was matched with a tutor who had similar interests and subjects. After several lessons, she found that she had a genuine connection with her mentor: “I really enjoyed it. I became really good friends my tutor.” With passions for Physics and Classics, Lucy was sold when she found out that her chosen tutor had actually taken scholarship classes in both subjects. “It kind of automatically felt like: ‘this is the person that should be teaching me’. From that moment, I was like ‘yeah I actually trust this person with my education first this year.” In lessons, Lucy learned to put less pressure on herself, and celebrate personal goals rather than holding herself to extreme standards all the time.

“It helped me set the course of my life”

Lucy is now pursuing a conjoint degree with a BSc in Physics and a BA in Classics at Victoria University of Wellington. She works for Inspiration Education as a tutor on the side. Lucy’s always had a passion for learning, and her studies today are driven by that passion. But she recalls a time in her life – like many other teenagers – where she was nervous about her where her interests might take her:

“I was telling my tutor and panicking, like ‘I don’t know what I want to do!’ And then she was like, ‘well what subjects do you like? Why not just study those?’ It was a moment where I realised that I can actually do what interests me and what I’m good at, and let the dominoes fall into place at a later day. It helped set the course of my life, and let me not worry that I didn’t have everything sorted all at once.”

“I already knew the payout, because I had been the payout”

Today, Lucy’s sure that her experience as a student herself influences her tutoring approach. When one of her students is having a difficult day, she has the experience and empathy to help them overcome it.

“I think being an IE student first definitely meant that when I entered working as a tutor, I kind of knew what was going on.” Lucy thinks it’s important to be perceptive to your student’s circumstances, and use those factors to tailor her lessons accordingly.

“As a student, I understood why [tutoring] is a lot of effort, it’s more than just ‘let’s sit down and go through your homework’ – it’s not just content, it’s all the other stuff. On the hard days, it makes it feel more natural. I already knew the payout, because I had been the payout.”

“IE’s really cool because we look at the student as a whole, and also the learning as a whole.”

This idea – that having a tutor is almost like having a mentor – is a key component to IE’s approach, and one of the things Lucy most values about the company.

“Tutoring allows someone outside of the school to kind of assess the situation and be like: ‘how can we change this? How can we make the student enjoy their school more, or make it more effective?’ it’s good for people who want the ability to have someone on the outside, who’s almost holding their hand, going ‘this is what we’re going to do to answer your issues.’”

“It’s an incredible job”

Lucy says that Inspiration Education improved her life in a number of ways. Once a student herself and now an experienced tutor in the same company, Lucy says she “tells everyone that they should apply,” simply because “it’s an incredible job.”

Lucy also believes receiving tutoring at high school helped her gain crucial life skills – which have gone on to serve her at University and in the workforce – and her focus in lessons is to give that same confidence to her students. “For example, if we say someone has an English tutor, with the internal where they have to do public speaking, it’s helpful to have someone who can honestly listen to you without judgement, and be like, ‘this is the issue, and let’s work on it together without having to worry about the outside world.’” She understands that teenagers tend to worry about what everyone else is thinking of them, and having some external guidance can make a world of difference.

If people want to move onto further study at uni, Lucy believes tutoring is a great way to secure their learning and gain those skills. It’s the extra assurance of knowing, “‘I’ve already done all this before because someone has kind of guided me, I can actually go into the real world myself now.’ Because that’s what the real world is – it’s doing it yourself.”

“Talk to your child before putting them in tutoring”

For parents who are unsure about whether they should get their child a tutor, Lucy advises asking the child first. “What are your reasons for putting them in tutoring? If it’s just because they’re getting Merits and you want them to get Excellences, then check with them and actually see whether they are happy with their Merits”.

They might decide that instead of just ‘good grades’, they want to reinforce some of their learning skills, or regain some confidence, or simply have more security in their learning. In these cases, Lucy believes it’s beneficial to have someone “on the outside” guiding you, and giving you honest advice.

“It’s a really cool dynamic that no one here is a teacher, no one has any repercussions towards your school, no one cares if you’re head boy, no one cares if you did class all the time. We just want to honestly help you. There doesn’t necessarily need to be an issue obviously, it can just be that you want some security in your learning. But if you try it out and you go ‘oh actually i don’t really feel like I’m reaping the rewards of this’, that doesn’t hurt – at least you’ve given it a shot.”