How SabiTeach Helps Locate Qualified Private Tutors Around Your Neighbourhood

Searching for the right tutor to help your children through tight spots in subjects and earn a good grade can be tasking. SabiTeach, a Nigerian ed-tech startup has, however, created a tutoring marketplace that can help remove the worry of searching by connecting parents and students to qualified tutors around their neighbourhood.

The startup has a database of trained and experienced tutors around different communities that can easily be accessed using a learning style algorithm. SabiTeach tutors provide both physical learning and virtuals for students.

High Demand for Qualified Teachers

In Nigeria, the current teacher to student ratio is 1:60. There is, therefore, growing demand for quality teachers. The UN sustainable development goal seeks to reduce the student to teacher ratio to be 1:20 by 2030.

SabiTeach, founded in July 2018 by Wale Ogunjobi seeks to solve the rising demand for quality teachers in Nigeria and also help teachers make more money through its marketplace.

Due to the current pandemic, the startup partnered with LearnCube, a UK based online classroom designed for teaching, tutoring, and training to foster virtual learning in the country.

With the promise that finding tutors on the SabiTeach platform was a simple, easy and fast process, I tried out the platform.

Finding Your Tutor

Navigating the platform was simple. By entering the subject, level of studies and my location, I was able to see a shortlist of tutors to choose from.

Scrolling down the main page the platform explained how to easily find a tutor and also listed shortcuts to find tutors for about six major subjects.

After selecting a tutor, a profile showing the ratings will be made available to you. Also available is the course taught and the level the tutor teaches. The page also has subs where you can read about the tutors, education experiences and reviews by past learners.

If the tutor meets your requirement you can now click on the hire button or close to check out other tutors. However, it is imperative that you check carefully when selecting a tutor as SabiTeach in its terms and condition said it does not do background checks on its tutors.

So before you leave your child with a stranger it is safer to do extra diligence in reviewing and investigation of self-reported credentials, education, and experience. Also, there are several locations like Yaba that didn’t have tutors for essential subjects like the English language for senior secondary.

The location tag makes sure that the shortlisted tutors are a reasonable distance from your home

When you select the hire button, you will be ported to a page where you have to sign in with your email and password, if you already have an account or signup if you are new to the platform.

Creating a new Learner Account

By clicking on the sign-up link on the sign-in page you can easily access the page to create a new account. To open a new account you will need to enter your first name, last name, email address, phone number and password.

Also, you will have to agree to the terms and conditions before you can sign up. However, if you are under 13, the terms say you are not permitted to access the platform.

After signing up, a personal dashboard is created. It contains a learner profile, mailbox, schedules and appointments. It also has a personal wallet and a table showing a list of all, current, completed and cancelled appointments.

Scheduling an appointment

Once you have selected a tutor you can set an appointment by clicking the hire button. You can then select the subject(s) you want your child to learn, select the level, the lesson date from start to end, lesson time from starting and ending.

Lessons will also be scheduled as well as the mode of tutorial delivery. Due to the COVID-19 outbreak, the only delivery currently available is online.

After reviewing all the selected choices you can then schedule the appointment. You will be prompted that the tutor has been notified and a message to proceed with payment will be sent to your mail.

Payment options and cost of tutoring

The cost of tutoring on the platform ranged from N1000 to N3,000 per hour. To pay for tutorials, parents can add money into the digital wallet created on the platform.

By clicking the plus button on the wallet and entering the amount you want to pay you can use your card through a secure Flutterwave payment gateway to add money into it.

SabiTeach bills learners monthly for the total hours of tutor to learner engagement. The startup pays the tutors about 80% of the earnings and takes the remaining 20% as commission.

Becoming a tutor on SabiTeach

For teachers who are are looking for supplementary sources of income, you can signup on SabiTeach. To become a teacher on the platform, you can simply click on the ‘Become a SabiTeacher’ link and enter the information inquired.

You have to enter your first name, last name, phone number, email address, state of residence – this only shows six states, meaning that physical tutoring is only available in Lagos, Abuja, Ibadan, Kano, Port Harcourt and Enugu.

Also, you must enter your Instagram handle, courses you have experience in and upload a detailed CV. After that, you just need to agree to the terms and conditions click on register and wait for your account to be created.

In summary, the Nigerian education sector is estimated to be worth about $40 million. SabiTeach hopes to gain a sizeable chunk of the market share by leveraging on the growing demand of quality teachers.

So if you are searching for a qualified tutor to teach your kids, you can browse through the catalogues, you might just find one around your neighbourhood.