Abstract:

The school-university transition and all that it entails, such as the increased responsibilities and demands for autonomous management of time and study planning, represents a delicate experience of profound change for every university student. For this reason, career services play a fundamental role in the current socioeconomic context characterized by instability and rapid changes. They help to pursue educational goals and promote adaptability and future life-career planning. With these assumptions, at the University of Milan-Bicocca, a tutoring service for first-year, second-year, and master students was activated in 2013 and operated by senior students. Born as a pilot project within the Department of Psychology in the 2018/2019 Academic Year, it now involves around 150 tutors, reaching almost 4000 students. The tutors took part in a training process divided into six meetings of 2 hours each, conducted by two psychologists - coordinators of the tutoring project - and the professor in charge of the service. The topics covered in these meetings were synergistic with the period of the Academic Year. They included both general topics concerning tutoring and, more specifically, the university's training and evaluation process, the planning of exams, access to the world of work, or some training activities for the tutors. One of the formative activities was called “If I Were” and aimed to intercept the representation of the tutoring service by the tutors themselves. The "If I Were" activity is a classic activity that allows everyone to re-construct their vision of any social phenomenon (in this case, the tutoring service), associating it with animals (e.g., fireflies, otters, pilot fish, etc.), objects (e.g., compass, torch, etc.), and famous characters (such as Virgilio with Dante, Albus Silente, Astolfo, etc.). The activity of associations is anything but neutral because it reveals clues about everyone's visions and representations. The “If I Were” game helps the tutors get to know each other better and discover visions, motivations, values, and interests about the tutoring activities. During the presentation, the structure of the tutoring service will be described in more depth. Some contributions will be offered regarding what has been learned during these years of organizing and managing the service. Furthermore, the presentation will focus on the representations of the service. Indeed, through analyzing several metaphors reported by tutors, such as fireflies, compasses, and Virgil with Dante, it emerged that those who become tutors shared the values of helping people, building relationships, and becoming a guide, aspects they considered fundamental in the career-building process.

Keywords:

Peer tutoring, school-university transition.