Up and Coming Weekly is a weekly publication in Fayetteville, NC and Fort Bragg, NC area offering local news, views, arts, entertainment and community event and business information.
Issue link: http://www.epageflip.net/i/1488233
WWW.UPANDCOMINGWEEKLY.COM 18 UCW DECEMBER 14 - 20, 2022 Student Learning Center serves diverse student population by MARY TULEY Fayetteville Technical Community College's Student Learning Center has had a few names and several locations through the years, but it has always been solid, reliable, helpful. Students approaching it are feeling anxious, exhausted, or mystified, but they leave with answers. And the only thing that anybody ever needs is a student ID. In the Learning Center, alongside our director Kareka Chavis, we've worked with several stu- dents, but our oldest student, who had no trouble whatsoever with computers and who took classes simply because she loved to learn, was 85. We have students from most of the continents, many dozens of countries, and of course Fort Bragg. ey have children or even grandchil- dren, jobs and spouses, medical conditions or test anxiety. ey were inducted into the National Honor Society yesterday, or they're being deployed tomorrow. ey haven't taken a class in 35 years, or they'll be receiving high school diplomas and associate degrees on the same happy evening in May. From here, they'll be going to Pembroke or Princeton. ey have no idea what they want to do, or they've had the same dream since they were six years old. When they visit us, they're met by talented in- structors who take tremendous satisfaction from watching the light turn on in a student's mind. We tutor in English and anything that requires writing (sociology, history, religion, psychology, biology…), in every imaginable level of math, in chemistry and Spanish and accounting, in the scary behemoth known as computer science. Classroom professors donate their time to work alongside our students a couple of hours a week. We have separate but neighboring math, writing, and science labs. We partner with the men's and women's bas- ketball teams, the baseball and softball teams, and the volleyball team, all of whose athletes spend time with us. Nursing and dental-technol- ogy students come with their study groups be- cause our smaller rooms are conducive to serious concentrating. And every now and then we have something for everyone to eat because, after all, man does not live by Excel alone. When COVID struck, we and our students needed a minute to regain our mental equilib- rium. e entire campus was eerily quiet, and everything seemed unfamiliar. We recovered, but vast numbers of our classes were converted to online. Now, after a couple of years, the online courses co-exist peacefully with their face-to- face counterparts, but students of all ages and backgrounds have moments or entire semesters of desperately needing personal attention and immediate answers to questions. Of course, here we still are, upstairs in the VCC building. Last week, I had students from Egypt, South Korea, Senegal, Yemen, India and Nigeria. And Hope Mills, Spring Lake and Raeford. All of them were panicked about the essays that needed to be written today, from scratch, and submitted tonight. Typical day in the Student Learning Cen- ter! Let us help you find your way forward! For more information contact tuleym@faytechcc.edu or 910-678-8266. EDUCATION MARY TULEY, Lead English Instructor, FTCC Student Learning Center COMMENTS? Editor@upandcomingweek- ly.com. 910-484-6200 Instructors are available in the Student Learning Center to assist FTCC students with a variety of subjects. (Photo courtesy Fayetteville Technical Community College) C u st o m C a teri n g by T w o B r o t h ers Private Romantic Aordable Specializing In: Weddings, Corporate Events, Holiday Parties, Special Banquets & More! eVineNC.com or TwoBrothersCateringNC.com 806 Katie Street Fayetteville NC (O Owen Drive behind O-Reilly's) Custom Catering By:Two Brothers Call us to schedule your next event! Call 910-584-9892 Serving You Since 2004