Varsity Tutors Review 2024: Do Students Like it? [Truth]

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Academic validation is a major thing nowadays and students get crushed upon not receiving significant results no matter how much time they actually spend studying.

One of the major reasons why students don’t achieve the results they want is that they end up being confused or couldn’t apply the logic properly due to limited understanding of concepts. 😘

So if you have been wondering about getting professional help or private tutoring classes, Varsity Tutors is one of the many platforms that would gladly provide the help you need.

In this dedicated and comprehensive Varsity Tutors review, we will be rating the platform on a number of factors including offered benefits, types of available tutoring sessions, pricing, available subjects, personalized learning, along with customer support.

What is Varsity Tutors?

Varsity Tutors was founded in 2007 and is headquartered in St. Louis, MO. The parent company of Varsity Tutors, named Nerdy, partnered up with TPG Pace Tech Opportunities in September 2021 at a market valuation of $1.7 billion.

The online learning platform offers specialization in Test Preparation, Academic Tutoring, and AI. The Varsity Tutors is one of the leading live online learning platforms that benefits both the learners as well as experts.

You have access to extensive and high quality learning action plans and deliver live expertise for students across thousands of subjects and various learning formats through the use of the latest technology and artificial intelligence.

What Does Varsity Tutors Offer?

The learning platform offers offline and online tuition classes through its various business outlets spread across multiple states of the USA. You can go for private, one on one tutoring lessons, small group classes, local school workshop programs, summer learning camps and large group classes.

The classes can be conveniently delivered on more than 3,000 topics, for different levels from elementary to graduation. You can select the academic sessions and schedule over various matching criteria, such as price, class days, time, grade levels, etc.

Getting Started With Varsity Tutors

The process to sign up with the Varsity Tutors is very easy and does not need more than a couple of minutes. Follow the steps given below in order to create your account.

First and foremost, head to the official Varsity Tutors official page.
Click on the “Create A Practice Test Account” and you’ll be redirected to the sign up form.
Enter the personal details such as first name, last name, email address and password.
Once you have filled out the form, click on the “Create Account – It’s Free” button and check the T&C boilerplate.
Next up you will be redirected to the Varsity Tutors dashboard where you can either create a custom test or choose from existing tests/ flashcards.

Varsity Tutors – Types Of Tutoring Sessions

You have access to various types of study sessions and can choose the one based on your needs and requirements. The details regarding each one of them are as follows.

One to One Private Tutoring

If you select one to one tutoring, you would meet with a handpicked expert on the live learning platform of Varsity Tutors and get access to highly customized and focused instructions in the preferably selected subjects from the entire catalog. 😇

The tutoring model works on a personalized approach achieved by following some protocols. The first step is to let your coach know where you lack and struggle along with what your goal is. Once you have shared your thoughts and insights a dedicated and dynamic learning plan is created just for you.

The tutor assigned to you is selected from the community of more than 40,000+ experts through various filters and matching algorithms. Some of the benefits of going with private coaching lessons are as follows.

Varsity Tutors One To One Private Tutoring

Easy Collaboration – The learner, as well as the tutor, have access to a number of interactive tools including video chat and shared workspaces which makes the sessions much more focused and personalized.
Post Session Recordings – After every session, the recordings are at your disposal in case you want to revise and go over a topic covered to get a better grasp and understanding of the concepts.
Convenient – The platform offers high quality educational classes yet them being convenient in terms of place, time, day, etc.

Online Tutoring

The platform lets you sign up for the online sessions which take place in a secure environment and you can connect to the classroom via a desktop or mobile device.

The Live Learning Platform provides features and functionalities such as a whiteboard, video chat, and integrated practice problems along with subject specific tools like a document editor and a periodic table for example.

Students also have the benefit of replay session recording in order to understand and revise the concepts discussed.

Instant Tutoring

With Instant Tutoring option available you do not have to wait around to schedule your classes, you can start whenever you want, no cap. The tutors are available throughout the day and the night making the whole process of signing up for the lessons very easy and accessible.

The tutoring sessions are available in more than 250 subjects from all the different academic fields for all grade levels right from the elementary school to college to test preparation for the exams like ACT, SAT, GRE GMAT, etc.

This type of tutoring sessions are beneficial for students in case they are dealing with homework emergencies, wanna practice the languages, or need last minute exam preparation.

Small Group Classes

In case you want to get lessons but prefer being in a group to make the most out of discussions and other people point of views or study groups are your kind of thing, then you can go with small group tutoring sessions.

The average number of students in the class can be anywhere from 5 to 15 and offers expert interaction, collaboration, and lessons tailored to suit almost all of the learner’s pace.

You can select any classes from the available list of over 3,000 subjects, a wide range of academic, test prep and enrichment resources and benefit from the social interaction with peers.

Live Large Group Classes

The classes consisting of large groups can accommodate 500 and above learners. These sessions are led by subject-matter experts which can last from a single day to a couple of weeks. Needless to say the topic of discussion can be picked from a vast range of subjects.

The courses are also taught by celebrity experts and have featured graduates from top schools like Yale, Johns Hopkins, Michigan, an astronaut, veteran teachers, a neuroscientist, teacher and the instructor of the year winners, and more. 😉

You can filter out the live online classes on the basis of price, grade levels, subjects, class dates, duration, class days, time, large group and collections.

Some of the things that you can expect from these sessions are as follows:

Live interactive online classes led by highly professional and subject expert instructors consisting of Q&A sessions and discussions on student projects.
Topics covered include core curriculum subjects along with electives that empower learning as well as inspire curiosity.

Self Study Classes

With self study resources and adaptive assessments, you can establish your foundational knowledge by improvising the areas you lack in. You have access to a wide library of extensive adaptive practice problems streamlined with your academic standards.

You can take help of self study tools, tests and recorded videos to prepare and advance in your set educational goals even at your own pace. You can accelerate your learning process by combining the self reflective or study tools with some kind of tutoring classes.

Varsity Tutors For School

With Varsity Tutors for school, you can customize and deliver personalized live learning experiences to every student in your school district with the help of their all in one platform.

The platform has partnered up with more than 100 district schools to meet their needs of fair educational accessibility to improve the overall development of every student through personalized training.

You can select the tutor best suitable to your liking from a network of more than 4,000 experts that meets the demands of industries. The dynamic educational action plan is prepared to suit every single student and constantly empowers them to study smartly while grasping what is being taught.

Varsity Tutors Solutions For Schools

The platform lets you create personalized learning solutions proven to accommodate your needs and improve your educational status. The offered solutions by Varsity Tutors for various district schools are as follows:

VT High Dosage

For an effective and better learning experience for both the tutor and students, Varsity Tutors lets them use a highly engaging and interactive platform along with the advanced tools and technologies.

The Live Learning platform is designed for the seamless collaboration and communication flow so that the coaches can focus and help out every single one of the students.

The VT high dosage tutoring includes one to one private lessons as well as small group classes consisting of learners no more than five. Key aspects related to VT high dosage tutoring classes are as follows:

Frequent Instructions – The sessions are scheduled at least three times every week in both private and small groups. The tutors use high quality instructional materials aligned with your educational standards and classwork.
Data driven personalization – The study programs are curated on the basis of data in order to create an academic roadmap which focuses on students’ skills gaps, cater to their needs, build the concepts and evaluate the effectiveness of the action plan.
Tutor-Student Relationship – Learners work with an expert tutor that is consistent with their classes while simultaneously building a strong mentor- student relationship to understand students’ learning requirements.
Embedded Tutoring Programs – You can schedule the tutoring classes for the students whenever it is most suitable for the students. If you wanna do it before, during or just after the school ends, no problem, you’ve got it, since the main purpose of it all is to make education accessible to all.

VT On Demand

With VT On Demand, every single student gets access to personalized learning support no matter the time of the day or where you are. 😍

Learners have the benefit of unlimited and real time contact support from subject specific experts along with self study resources based on proficiency levels and always-on enrichment–at an annual fixed per student cost.

Unlimited Summer Learning Camps

The Varsity Tutors also provide schools with personalized summer boot camps for education enrichment that are also fun to do. They deliver a customized robust learning experience for all the K-8 students.

With unlimited summer learning programs you have access to all the live, camps as well as on demand classes which basically helps you expand your knowledge by learning new concepts to acceraelate your academic growth.

How Do Varsity Tutors Ensure Personalized Learning?

Some of the ways through which personalized roadmaps are created are as follows.

Adaptive Diagnostics – The adaptive diagnostic is a pre-assessment test taken by learners before their personalized action plan is created. This assessment tests a particular student’s foundational concepts and helps to determine as well as evaluate their subject proficiency and discovers the knowledge gaps.

The generated results give insights related to the learner’s root skill level on the basis of which a personalized learning roadmap is developed. You can be rest assured that these learning strategies can help you drastically improve your educational journey by targeting your weak academic areas and making you work on it.

Student And Tutor Matching – The platform has a student and tutor matching mechanism which takes into consideration more than 100 aspects so that you can get assigned or select the academic coach which optimizes and is streamlined with your academic learning process and the outcome.

When put in relation with small group classes, the learners are assigned to the group of peers that have similar educational needs and subject proficiency level so that everyone can grow together with the help of social and collaborative learning. This includes support for students in need of academic intervention like that of math, science, english, coding and so much more.

Reassessments – These tests are basically the timely check-ins that are scheduled and taken by students in order to determine their learning status. The reassessments are compared with the initial diagnostic assessment and on these grounds the progress of an individual is measured. It also helps tutors verify if the set learning roadmap is working for a student or not as well as acts as a sign if they have to create a new action plan for more effective and better future learning outcomes to achieve the desired academic goal.

Varsity Tutors – Available Classes, Subjects & Topics

The platform has a wide library of subject selection lists from which you can choose the fields you need academic help with. The available classes and dedicated specializations are as follows.

Art – Acting, Art History, Drawing, Dance, Film Making, Music, Painting And Photography.
English – Creative Writing, Literature, Reading, Vocabulary, Writing, Phonics, Spelling, Public Speaking, and Special Education.
Enrichment – After School, Cooking, Fitness, Personal Finance, Social Skills, Gaming, Logic Building, Study Skills and Organization.
Languages – Spanish, French, Italian, German, English Language, Mandarin Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Latin and Sign Language. 😊
Math – Numbers, Algebra, Fractions, Calculus, Puzzles, Geometry, Statistics, Trigonometry, Elementary Math, Middle School Math, High School Math, College Math, etc.
Technology & Coding – Animation, Python, Machine Learning, Databases, Game Design, Computer Hardware, Java, Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, Civil and Mechanical Engineering.
Science – Archaeology, Astronomy, Biology, Chemistry, Physics, Physiology, Anatomy, Earth Sciences, etc.
Social Studies – American History, Geography, World History and Government.
Business – Accounting, Business Calculus, Economics, Marketing, MBA, Supply Chain Management, Finance, MBA, etc.
Humanities – AP History, AP Human Geography, Law, Literature, Theology, etc.

Varsity Tutors – Test Preparation

Needless to say, the instructors community at Varsity Tutors are highly intellectual, professional and possess a great deal of knowledge related to various subjects and fields. If you need preparation classes for some specific exams then you do not need to look any further than Varsity Tutors.

The platform offers dedicated support for all kinds of tests and grade levels. Below written are the categories of levels and exams for which the classes are provided.

Grades K-8 – The study sessions are available for the following tests namely, CogAT, HSPT, ISEE, MAP, SSAT, and TACHS.
Grades 9 To 12 – The test prep sessions are provided for ACT, AP, ASVAB, GED, MAP, PSAT, SAT, SHSAT, and SSAT.
Graduate School – DAT, GMAT, LSAT, GRE, MCAT and PCAT.

Varsity Tutors – Special Differences & Educational Solutions

Unlike other education platforms, Varsity Tutors extends its platform’s services and tutoring sessions to special children. So whether you struggle with dyslexia, ADD, ADHD, Autism, Learning Disabilities, and Special Education.

The students diagnosed with these special differences are placed in an Individualized Education Plan (IEP) or a 504 Plan.

IEP – IEP is an Individualized Education Plan where the students who are unable to meet the certain academic criteria then new standards are created designed with the intentions to help the learners who are lacking behind. The learning roadmap is set to meet the needs as well as pace of the students to help them make progress with their course.

504 Plan – It is a list of accommodations the school commits to and is created with the intentions of helping students work within the school environment. Some of the things that are adjusted include extra time to take tests, less or modified homework, better seat arrangements to avoid distractions, permission to use a fidget toy during class, etc.

Varsity Tutors Pricing Plan

The pricing of any specific class depends on a number of attributes including your preferred type of tutoring, class requirements, grade level and geographical location.

The charges can cost anywhere between $10 to $90 per hour depending on the type of sessions you signed up for. On an average, students are charged around $65 which if considered is pretty affordable.

However, the platform does not openly or clearly display the pricing models for any of the classes or subjects. And since the cost is unclear before you actually subscribe to the tutoring sessions, it could be considered as one of the drawbacks of the platform.

Varsity Tutors – Guarantee Policy

The platform offers a guarantee policy that applies to one-on-one tutoring and group session courses. The details regarding guarantee and refund policies are given below.

Eligibility Requirements

One to One tutoring

The prerequisites to be eligible for the Better Score Guarantee are as follows:

You need to purchase a 1:1 tutoring package of at least 24 hours in any of the eligible test subjects.
You must complete a minimum of 24 hours of tutoring within the 3 months time period preceding the date on which you will be taking the tests.
Within 10 days of purchase you need to submit the official test score for a baseline Varsity Tutors.

1:1 Tutoring Refund – In case you have subscribed for private tutoring and your scores are not improved and meet all the eligibility requirements, then you are eligible for either of the following clauses.

You are entitled to receive your money back for your most recent Eligible Test 1:1 Tutoring package.
Receive one time credit for the same number of tutoring hours as the originally purchased one in the same Eligible Test subject.

Group Course Tutoring

The conditions to be met are as follows:

You need to purchase a “Group Course” in any of the eligible test subjects with a tutor acquired through the Varsity Tutors platform.
You need to attend all of the “Group Course” sessions which are included as a part of your service purchase.
Within the 10 days of purchase, you are required to submit an official test score of the Eligible Test to your tutors that serves as a Baseline Test Score.

Group Course Refund Clauses – You can go with either of the following options; you can ask for your payment to be refunded back for the Group Course you have purchased for the Eligible Test or get a single time credit for the same Group Course. 😚

Pros and Cons of Varsity Tutors

👍 Pros

The platform has a community of an overwhelming number of high quality educators with subject specific knowledge across various domains.
Varsity Tutors cover a wide range of academic domains including exams specific training, language practice lessons and coursework for all levels right from kindergarten to college.
You have access to a lot of different tutoring sessions such as one to one private lessons, small group classes, large group classes, instant and online tutoring.
The lesson plans are customized to compliment your pace, academic needs and make sure the roadmap is based on your subject proficiency to offer a personalized tutoring experience.
Even though you are matched with your assigned tutor after the platform’s algorithm filters out the coaches on the basis of multiple attributes, you can still switch your tutor if not satisfied.

👎 Cons

The platform doesn’t paint a clear picture in regards to the information about the prices. The prices actually depend on a lot of factors such as type of tutoring sessions, location, etc making the whole concept a little confusing.
Even though the mentors or tutors hired by the Varsity platform are thoroughly vetted and go through an immense interview process, the quality of education received depends from instructor to instructor.

Varsity Tutors – Customer Support

The platform has an extensive website which consists of information related to their various services, solutions, advanced tools and resources, available classes, tutoring sessions and so much more.

You can reach out to the support team via phone call services on number (800) 908-4120 or connect with them by joining their social forums on platforms like Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, etc.

Conclusion – Do Students Like it?

Wrapping up our Varsity Tutors review by presenting our opinions as well as the goods and the bad. The live learning platform has been connecting students and experts of all ages for personalized educational training in over 3,000 subjects for a long time now.

Yes, because the platform has an easy-to-use interface, offers a community of over 4,000 tutors, provides tons of self-help resources, personalized lesson plans, different types of sessions, and so much for students.

On the downside, it doesn’t offer clear details about the prices and the only way to contact them is through phone call.

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