On the third floor of Cal Poly’s Building 14, Room 309 is filled with a steady current of problem-solving and peer support. Laptops glow, whiteboards fill with code and soft conversations echo between students leaning in over shared problems. It’s not a classroom, but it might be where some of the most meaningful learning happens for computer science and software engineering students.
Welcome to the CSSE Tutoring Center, a student-run hub offering peer-to-peer help for foundational courses in the major. Each weekday from 2 to 8 p.m., students drop in for guidance, troubleshooting and, often, encouragement. The center is led by a team of tutors, most of them upper-division CSSE majors, who have been in the exact same seat as the students they’re helping.
“It’s a safe space. There’s no such thing as a dumb question,” said Akash Praveen, a computer science senior who serves as one of the lead tutors. “Once the ice is broken, students realize we’ve all been there.”
Praveen and fellow senior Tyler Hlaing coordinate scheduling and oversee a team of 15 tutors, each of whom works four to six hours a week. The structure is simple — two tutors are on duty each hour — but the impact is significant. In a typical quarter, the center sees hundreds of visits.
The benefits of in-person tutoring go beyond debugging code. “Tutoring shines in helping students identify the sticking points on the way to a solution,” Praveen said. “ChatGPT might give you an answer, but we’re trained to spot where a student is struggling and guide them step-by-step. That’s where the real learning happens.”
Both Praveen and Hlaing say the work has deepened their own understanding of the material, sharpened their communication skills and boosted their confidence.
“I’ve learned so much just by explaining things in different ways,” Hlaing said. “You start to see problems from new angles, and you build soft skills that are so valuable in the workplace.”
As a computer science professor and faculty adviser, Ayaan Kazerouni sees those gains firsthand. Since taking over as tutor supervisor a few years ago, he’s worked to expand the center’s hours and help tutors develop as both instructors and learners.
“Learning is social,” Kazerouni said. “Tutors can do what artificial intelligence can’t: they ask guiding questions, adapt to a student’s understanding and create a space where it’s OK to struggle. Even if a tool like ChatGPT can generate a solution, there’s still value in students working through the problem themselves.”
Kazerouni noted that students often find it easier to ask questions of a peer than a professor. “As instructors, we sometimes have expert blind spots. Tutors remember what it’s like to not know something, and that empathy is powerful.”
That empathy fuels a sense of community and continuity. Some students who once relied on the Tutoring Center now help run it. “You hear things like, ‘You’re the reason I feel confident going into my next CS class,’ and then those students come back and apply to be tutors,” Praveen said. “It’s incredibly rewarding.”
Funding for the center’s tutors comes from Cal Poly’s Earn by Doing program, which allows students to gain paid experience while helping others. Now, thanks to a generous matching gift from Patrick Hanlon (Mechanical Engineering, ‘92), every dollar donated to the Computing Tutors, Techs and TAs campaign will be doubled, up to $25,000.
Kazerouni hopes additional funding will not only support more tutoring hours but also allow for better data collection and outreach, especially as student habits shift in the age of AI.
Still, he believes that human connection will always be essential to learning.
“In the end,” he said, “learning is not about getting answers. It’s about building understanding — and doing that together.”
Call to Action
To support computing students through the Earn by Doing: Computing Tutors, Techs and TAs program — and have your gift matched — visit https://bit.ly/3Eih01w.
By Emily Slater
