The Reading and Writing Center at Fresno City College provides one-on-one tutoring for essay drafting, thesis statements, and study skills.

Alejandra Rodriguez, a student, visits the center often to sketch outlines, create a thesis and to have her assignments proofread. Rodriguez said, “The center has helped me a lot, I like the environment and thinks its friendly and helpful.”

They also host workshops that teach test taking skills, reading comprehension, punctuation and grammar, plagiarism, essay writing and formatting.  The center’s page offers online tutoring, a workshop calendar. and links to writing reference materials.

The Peer Assisted Study Session (PASS) program is developed to increase student’s success, and GPA through embedded tutoring in English,ESL, and small groups  designated for chosen criteria. PASS tutors are “model” students that provide peer mentorship with Reading and Writing skills to PASS students through scheduled small group tutoring sessions outside of help. Through the Disabled Student Program and Services, a Sign Language interpreter is available for deaf students. This was a problem before DSPS granted the Center a sign language interpreter, because priority goes to the classes throughout FCC.

Villalba has been collecting data over the past four years. According to Villalba “86 percent of students who attend the center multiple times have a grade higher than 60 percent of students who don’t use the center.”

The center has seen an increase in student attendance, from 500 in 2008 to 1,700 on average throughout the whole year, under Villalba’s supervision

“We are open to all classes that have reading or writing, some students may think we are only open to those taking English classes, that is not the case,” Villalba said.

“The Reading and Writing center not only benefits the students at FCC that seek help, it helps the student tutors who work there too by sharpening their academic skills,” said by Tabitha Villalba, the Coordinator of the Reading and Writing center.

Student tutors themselves polish their own skills first before they are able to help students.

They must go through tutor training to become better readers and writers while learning how to articulate ideas to other students.

Tabitha Villalba, said  “the greatest benefit for tutors is that it’s a very rewarding job.” She added, “All the student tutors that go there love helping students,  they’re happy to work with her.”