A Few Key Lessons About the World of Online Tutoring

The effective use of tutors in India to help students in America serves as a cautionary tale for education policymakers (“Calling India,” by Scott Kraft, May 6). We persist in the comforting delusion that a four-year college degree, particularly from a marquee-name school, will be the ticket to financial success.

This approach is not only unrealistic for the majority of college-bound students, but it is harmful for the majority of vocationally talented students. It exacerbates the appalling dropout rate among the latter group by forcing them to take courses they have no interest in, or aptitude for, when they could instead be taking classes that provide the training they want and need. By putting ideology before practicality, we virtually guarantee the perpetuation of the status quo.

Walt Gardner

Los Angeles

I fear that Scott Kraft was overly optimistic in his otherwise interesting article. He states: “Customer service agents answer our complaints from Bangalore.” In my experience, these so-called service agents rarely resolve problems or answer direct questions; they do keep people on hold for endless periods and sometimes simply disconnect the caller. Another aspect of globalization.

Roxane Winkler

Sherman Oaks

I enjoyed this humorous piece. I now have a place to go for a job. Because, you see, I am a licensed professional engineer. My last job, locally, is now filled by an immigrant from India, a real nice guy who is very intelligent. The position I held before that is now filled by a native of India, another guy who seems very nice.

Between jobs I began to teach, earned a master’s and became licensed. But I see something on the horizon. I think I will begin to draw my Social Security checks and move to India. I can make $400 per month (maybe more since I am a native English speaker), I can learn Malayalam (add it to my spattering of German, Arabic and Spanish words), my wife and I can live well, and I can help with homework and not have to spend my evenings grading it.

K. Spooner

Mohave Valley, Ariz.