Carissa's Academic Tutoring

08/20/2026

yes, I'm good at other things besides tutoring lol

08/20/2026

Yes, you heard that right. The majority of University of Michigan 's fall 2025 class are out of state students. . .🤔

08/19/2026

Man, it's been a minute. . . .keeping up with social media and everything else is tough. However, I couldn't pass up the opportunity to share this article: "What is ‘Linguistic’ Phonics and Why Are Some Schools Adopting It?"

From the article:

"The linguistic phonics approach was first popularized by Diane McGuinness, a cognitive psychologist, in the 1990s. She argued that memorizing rules related to word structures was an overwhelming and ineffective way for children to learn to read. Instead, linguistic phonics relies on the brain’s ability to pick up on patterns and generalize information. Lessons teach common representations for different sounds, and then give students lots of opportunities to practice decoding words in connected text to make that knowledge stick."

Essentially, this approach better connects our inherent understanding of language that we have from speaking and connects it more clearly to reading and writing. Instead of introducing "new" concepts, linguistic phonics essentially builds on a person's already established language base, making it easier for people to make connections to sounds, letters, and words.

Read the article to learn more about this for yourself!

A new question is emerging in the "science of reading": Is one type of phonics instruction better than another?

07/30/2026

Georgia Tech has followed other schools like The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in dropping supplemental essays

I'm sure there are quite a few reasons driving this, but a lot of it probably comes from , essay redundancy, and the honest fact that most essays reiterate the same ideas

is still required for both

Questions? Dm or send and email to [email protected]

07/27/2026

This article is a few years old, but the message is relevant. I'm often asked by students and parents about how students can best prepare for success in college.

Well, that's a loaded question. College is very different from high school. AP classes, despite College Board's claims, are not the same as college courses. Sports are more demanding. Students have to follow the class syllabus on their own and be aware of due dates and expectations.

So how do you prepare students for this?

Encourage students embarking on their college journey to:

1) ask questions and go to office hours.

2) go to the academic resource center (or whatever it's called on their campus) and get some free tutoring

3) be prepared to fail that first test or assignment (it happens) and learn how to study better or approach the assignment differently (this is another good opportunity for going to office hours)

4) not expect to get As in college just because you got them in high school

5) stay away from AI

Most importantly, students need to be ready to learn and see things from another's perspective. They also need to know that while one should have fun in college, there are limits, and if those limits are exceeded, they will suffer academically. They need to know how to achieve success on their own.

The author was an advisor for six years and shares how straight-A students in high school might not necessarily be prepared for college.

07/22/2026

☀️

07/20/2026

Yes, I said it: is

It's not explicit. It steals ideas and styles from multiple sources without any sort of recognition of those sources.

This is why is flat and unoriginal.

Do you agree? Disagree? Leave your thoughts in the comments.

07/18/2026

Looking for scholarships???

There are a lot of no essay scholarships available at Scholly https://share.google/2Ch5LPsfSXoc3Q59F

07/17/2026

yes, using to generate ideas or write an essay is considered

This statement can be found on Common App 's website

Questions? send a DM or message to [email protected]

More on this tomorrow

07/16/2026

The is NOT a 5 paragraph essay

You read that right. Watch to find out why.