I am going to try to be a bit coded here; it occurs to me that there is no way to know whether or not the tutee for whom this post is composed will be able to access this post, and I certainly do not want to hurt anyone.
Therefore, I am going to be rather vague, but perhaps I can fill in some holes at the meeting if anyone is interested.
Here is what I am wondering in this reflection: what ought we to do if we think a tutee is getting too comfortable with us?
I really do enjoy running in to tutees around campus or even in the emporium--especially when they are somewhat socially awkward, quirky, or a bit out there (also known as way too far off of the mainstream mark to have a lot of friends at URI) and it is clear that they are particularly happy to see you because there aren't a lot of folks around for them to talk with.
I have particular sympathy for these folks since I went to a small liberal arts university with mostly snobby and apathetic classmates and very invested in the upper-middle class American mainstream, so my only real friends were my English professors.
This empathy is likely where my hesitation to cut off this tutor/tutee relationship lies, but I am afraid my tutee has crossed some weirdness boundary that I find troubling--a line, in fact, that propels me into a sort of ambivalence about the whole thing. I am drawn in, maybe, by his obvious need for a friend, but am rather repelled by the same.
The trouble is that social misfits tend to slowly latch on way too strong. They catch you unawares. You realize you may, in the long run, actually do more harm than good.
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I guess we can talk about specifics at the meeting. This sort of thing always creeps me out because I'm a paranoid person haha. But I've had a repeat tutee who is really cool-- I don't get the creepy vibe. I know that he just finds my style of tutoring helpful. I definitely think that in any case you should listen to you gut instinct, never ignore that or you can really get in trouble. Some of my friends ignore that instinct because they are really nice--but that polite-ness is NOT appropriate in every situation.
ReplyDeleteIts a little like the professonal/client relationship, do you think? I mean, I know that we are peers addressing peers, however, it is still a service role. We are also *working* in an official capacity within the University and offering a service to students who wish to take advantage of it...the service isn't friendship, or even personal advice. Am I wrong? This reminds me not so much of trouble that I have run into in the WC so far, but trouble I have definitely had with employers or employees who seem to overlook the fact that our relationship is fundamentally one of professional contract. Or is it? I mean we try to be more personal than that, we are more personal than that, but outside of our jobs or professional enviroment, the company we keep is based on so much more. It would be different if a colleague in a class asked personally for writing help- that could be a little make the friendship/tutor role blurry. Its so uncomfortable when friendliness and sympathy are misconstrued as genuine friendship and all that implies. I never know what to do, either.
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