Learning at ACE

ACE is located in the tunnel under the West Dining Center.

ACE is back and ready for students. Newcomers and veteran students are welcome to check out ACE, which offers a variety of services to help students in their academic careers. 

One of ACE’s most known resources is its tutoring, which covers a wide range of classes and subjects.

“We have tutors available in over 120 different courses here on campus and students can utilize tutoring services both with individual appointments, which are fantastic for getting that really focused work done, but students can also stop in during our drop in times,” said Michelle Pearson, Assistant Director for Learning Services. “It’s a great place to be working on homework. Maybe you don’t even know if you have a question yet but you can be here working on homework and if you have a question you can raise your hand and a tutor will come on over.” 

Students can make appointments through Navigate, just like they do for advising appointments, as well as view ACE’s drop in times. 

“Most of the courses we tutor are 100 level, 200 level courses. We really wanna make sure students can make that transition in their first and second years and be very productive and academically successful,” Pearson said.

These appointments are made for the specific courses students need help with, whether it’s preparing for a big test/assignment or just needing help going over the lesson from the day. 

“Don’t wait until you get stuck or are feeling lost, absolutely if you are stuck or lost come in and meet with a tutor, but really it’s about students wanting to do really well. Coming in and working with a tutor just helps for your own understanding and own learning. Why make that harder than it needs to be?” Pearson said.

ACE tutoring offers coaching from students who sat in those same classes and worked on the same assignments, meaning they have experience in those exact subjects. 

“The tutors are all peer tutors here, so all NDSU students who have taken the very same classes that you are taking, which means they are kind of like inside experts. It’s some of the best ways to study for a course, the best way to approach problems, the best way to approach pacing within the course, they are fantastic guides for that,” Pearson said.

ACE is located in the tunnel under the West Dining Center.
Photo Courtesy | Courtney Entzi

For older students interested in helping out, ACE is always looking for tutors and mentors.

“We are hiring new tutors every semester,” Pearson said. “If a student knows that they would like to be considered for tutoring there is an employment interest form right on the website. You can just go on, it takes about 10 seconds, you fill out that form and you will be the very first person to know when I have openings.”

ACE Tutoring is a resource available for all students, and those enrolled in classes not on navigate can still get help in the basics, like math and science. Pearson commented on how engineering majors utilize drop in times to work on their math skills in order to apply them to their complex assignments. ACE is well known for its tutoring but they also contain other resources.

“ACE as a whole constitutes both ACE tutoring, the Rising Scholars program and our space in general,” Pearson said.

The Rising Scholars Peer Mentor program is also housed within ACE and is meant for students wanting to work on their academic learning skills as well as get connected on campus. 

ACE is open for individual tutoring from 10-7 Monday through Thursday and Friday 10-4. They also take drop in times from 7-10 Monday through Thursday.

“ACE is a safe space for every single student at NDSU to utilize. That can be finding quiet study spaces individually or for group study, it’s also a great place to come and have your questions answered,” said Pearson. “If I could tell students anything about ACE it would be to utilize this service, come early and come often.”

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