Third of four stories
By Rick Vacek | February 19, 2025
There are two equally important reasons why students who work in the Student Success Center hang out there so often, even if they’re not on duty.
Friends.
Food.
Relationships are most certainly a key part of the mixture, but let’s not forget that the appetites of these University of Texas at Dallas students extend beyond improving their tutoring skills.
“We do use food to lure them in,” Dr. Julie Murphy, the SSC’s Senior Director, admitted with a hint of mischief.
Students bring in goodies to share with their peers, but the real prize is when a box of Assistant Director Mallory Matyk’s creations is on the table. The word is out: You’d better be in the office early if you want one … or two … or …
“By the end of the day, that box is empty, especially Mallory’s baking. She can really bake,” said senior Nive Bala, a Team Leader in the SSC’s Peer Tutoring program. “She made these oatmeal cookies that had some kind of glaze on them. I’m not an oatmeal person, and I still had three cookies. I hate oatmeal!
“She provides cakes for birthdays and really does help bring that sense of community and togetherness. I can tell she really cares about each of us as people and not just as her employees.”
Community. The word comes up often in conversations about the SSC, and not just because of cookies. The costume contest at Halloween also is a big hit.
It’s all part of the camaraderie that makes the SSC home to many student workers for three full years … after they took advantage of its services as freshmen.
“We all rely on each other to help each other out, and I think that helps build that sense of community,” Bala said.
The building process for this home away from home starts with shared passion and purpose.
“A lot of us go into this job because we want to help other people and serve other people,” Bala said. “One of my favorite things I’ve noticed with my co-workers is that they put each other first, and they really care about each other’s well-being and each other’s success.
“It’s not that competitive environment where it’s, ‘I’m doing better than you. I’m getting better grades than you.’ It’s, ‘I want you to do well and I want to do well, too.’ Just wanting the best for each other is really valuable.”
The all-for-one, one-for-all attitude stems from another shared personality trait: Becoming an effective Peer Leader requires humility, not hubris.
“Just because you’re really good at math and you can solve all the math problems doesn’t mean you can help somebody else,” Matyk said. “It doesn’t mean you can teach it.”
But it gets a lot easier to teach if the tutor has one important mindset.
“One of my most important roles as a Team Leader and one of my favorite parts of being a Team Leader is that I help instill confidence in new tutors,” Bala said.
“I remember coming into this job not knowing if I could tutor, if I could remember enough about the subject to do well. I struggled to communicate my ideas at first. I know so many times I had to rely on some of my Team Leaders just to finish the tutoring session.
“Now I can provide that help and reassure the new tutors that it’s OK if you don’t know everything. Your role as a tutor isn’t necessarily to know everything but to know how to use the resources that are given to you to help other people.”
The final piece is that tutors often study together. That’s another way they make each other more confident.
Tiffany Taylor, Team Leader for Academic Success Coaching, often studies with her Peer Leaders in their unit’s lounge. “It’s a pretty tight-knit group,” she said, adding that she and her peers are always on the lookout for students who seem motivated to graduate from being tutored to doing the tutoring.
Bala shares many of the same classes with her co-workers, and the combination of learning together and working together builds relationships organically.
“When you’re a Team Leader, lots of people are coming to you for help and for advice, so it’s easier to build that into personal connections,” she said. “I consider a lot of my co-workers very good friends.”
The SSC’s positive tone is orchestrated from the top. “We have an open door,” Murphy said, and the students certainly feel welcomed.
When Owais Sayeed, a Team Leader in the Peer-Led Team Learning (PLTL) program, was asked what makes it such a strong community, his answer was as deep as the bonds the SSC creates.
“I think the first thing is openness. We’re on a first-name basis with basically everybody in the office, and that helps us as colleagues. I can just talk to Julie. I can just talk to Mallory.
“I think all the professional staff makes an effort to connect with us. They’re aware of pop culture, the trends, you name it. They know a little bit of what’s going on, and they do put an effort into connecting with us and being there for us.
“They also understand that we’re students first. There are highs and lows, exams, projects – things come and go. They’re there to support us. So if there’s a week where I just have too much on my plate and I need someone else to pick it up, the professional staff is more than willing.
“It’s A, openness, and B, a willingness to support each other. The third aspect is the constant pursuit of excellence. There’s always a push toward success. Whether it’s broken or it’s working, we always try to see how we can improve it and take it to the next level.”
Matyk said the students being tutored also feel that sense of belonging, but for another reason:
“They sit in the giant Peer Tutoring Lab – in a busy week, we can have 800 people come through. They see all these students in there – 50, 80, 100 students at a time – and are like, ‘I’m not alone in this. I’m not alone in needing help.’ Or, ‘I’m not alone in understanding this physics topic that our professor has been going on about for two weeks and I’m still not getting it.’”
While the SSC always opens in the second week of the semester, it’s not uncommon for students seeking help to show up on the first day of classes. And then once they start coming regularly, Matyk frequently hears them say, “It’s not so bad. It’s not scary. It’s something I want to keep doing.”
They wouldn’t be so eager to visit if the environment wasn’t positive, just as the Peer Leaders probably wouldn’t be as eager to spend so much time there if they weren’t getting so much out of it, too.
Working there makes them more knowledgeable students and more skilled communicators. But it makes them even better people.
“They learn content, but I think from a different standpoint they’re learning so much more,” Matyk said. “They’re part of a community. They’re getting all these soft skills that they don’t know they’re getting. It’s like sneaking vegetables into your kids’ food.”
The sweet treats, on the other hand, are baked into the SSC’s atmosphere. But don’t be late.
“Whenever those drop,” Sayeed said, “you simply have to be in the office or they’re gone.”
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Also in this series:
Peer Leaders Help Make Student Success Center a Go-To Place