The College Skills Center held a pop-up tutoring event at the chess tables on Sept. 2 to spread awareness of tutoring.

The pop-up tutoring event introduced Contra Costa College students to the Campus-Wide Tutoring program and the other free-tutoring opportunities available at CCC.

The CWT program, located in the CSC, provides free peer tutoring in English, math, science and other courses at different locations, such as the Math Lab in AA-210, Center for Science Excellence in PS-109 and the Library and Learning Resource Center in LLRC-121.

To receive free tutoring, including drop-in and one-on-one tutoring, students must enroll in Math 875N and English 875N.

Peer-led-tutoring learning is a tutoring service developed last semester and net-tutoring is another new online tutoring service launched this semester.

Net-tutoring is carried out by a group of hired tutors holding at least bachelor degrees working full-time.

CSC office assistant Jordan Miller said the pop-up tutoring event  would encourage more students to sign up and receive free tutoring.

Assistant tutor coordinator Brandy Gibson said she is hoping to get a total of 20 percent of the student body registered for free tutoring this semester.

She said 13.9 percent of the student body enrolled in CWT last spring. A total of 859 students enrolled during spring 2015.

In fall 2013, the number of students enrolled was merely 45.

In comparison to fall 2013, the number of  student enrollment at the CWT has increased dramatically.

The pop-up tutoring event  has helped raise the number of CCC students in the free-tutoring program.

Gibson said the pop-up tutoring event helped to register an additional 50 students for math 875N and another 25 students in English 875N. The 875N courses are tutoring lab courses students must register for to receive free tutoring.

Gibson said most students do not realize they must register to receive free-tutoring.

“When students show up to receive free-tutoring, we encourage them to register for  the required courses,” she said. “But having to register to sign in for free-tutoring may sound intimidating and troubling to some students. ”

Gibson has consulted the Admissions and Records Department regarding this issue.

To improve students’ learning and academic performance, she is hoping to have every CCC student automatically enrolled in the free-tutoring course by next year.

“The tutoring class is free,” Gibson said. “So all students will have to do is sign in and experience the tutoring environment without having to worry about adding the class. Students won’t have to go through the trouble of registering. It’ll be easier for everybody. ”

The pop-up tutoring event also gave students who do not come to tutoring the chance to get to know some of CSC tutors and experience their tutoring services.

Several CSC tutors hung around the pop-up tutoring event to help students struggling with their assignments.

“I feel better now,” Middle College High School student and psychology major Anistii Davis said after getting help to solve a geometry problem. “When I struggled in geometry homework, there was no one to help me at home.”

CSC retention specialist Tracy Nunley said that as a retention specialist, she helps with the outreach of students and making sure the number of their enrollments stays high.

Nunley said pop-up tutoring stems from the concept of a pop-up restaurant.

“In San Francisco, many chefs got bored staying in the brick and the mortar establishments,” she said.  “To reach a lot of people, the chefs moved their services to where the majority of people were and advertised their skills. This way, they were able to attract more people to experience their food.”

Nunley said pop-up restaurants gave her the idea of taking CSC tutoring workshop outside the “brick and mortar,” to reach out to students across campus.

Students wandered about at the college’s chess tables and answered the free-tutoring surveys to get free food. The CSC tutors lingered for a while to assist students with their assignments.

“When a student comes to me saying they got an A on one of their assignments, I feel like a kid on a Christmas morning,” anthropology major and tutor Richard Schachair said.