Soaring in enrollment from 609 undergraduate and 55 graduate students in the 2023-2024 academic year to 717 and 68 respectively in 2023-2024, the Real Estate program is growing rapidly — and so is its need for tutoring resources.
Over the last academic year, Graaskamp Center Associate Director Greg Reed noticed questions coming from an increasing number of students that couldn’t be answered during class or instructor office hours. He and the Graaskamp Center team began organizing a tutoring program offered specifically for real estate students that launched in September to address this need.
Tutors include second-year Real Estate MBA student Aaron Kindle and undergraduate seniors Monika Multhauf and Aiden McCarthy, both studying real estate and finance. The program is open to all real estate students and non-real estate students enrolled in real estate courses. Courses covered by the program are Real Estate 306, 410/710, 411, 412, 415/715 and 661/750.
Kindle, who serves as the program’s coordinator, developed an interest in teaching during his time in the military and first-year in the MBA program. He is grateful for the opportunity to have a positive impact on the lives of fellow students, he said. “Our mission has been to have a positive impact on the real estate students in all our programs and provide a resource that we believed could fill a need in our educational community,” Kindle said.
Multhauf said she regularly assisted others with classwork when she took core business courses earlier in her time as a student. Being a tutor allows her to help people on a larger scale. And the work tutors put into the program goes right back to them — they report feeling reengaged with material they’ve already learned, building a bigger picture of course concepts.
All three tutors have worked closely with guidance from Reed and Real Estate Program Director Tim Carr to lay the groundwork for a program that will last for years, Kindle said.
“It’s rewarding knowing that students are learning foundational knowledge that will foster greater understanding in their current and future real estate coursework,” Reed said. “There are few things as frustrating to me as not understanding or comprehending key topics, concepts or key words used in the commercial real estate industry.”
Senior undergraduate real estate student Isabel Wellisch has found attending tutoring beneficial not only because tutors take the time to make sure she understands difficult concepts, but she has also met peers in her classes whom she now works through difficult coursework with. Tutoring has become a social space for students to connect, which is an essential skill in the commercial real estate industry, Multhauf said.
Wellisch and real estate undergraduate junior Gracie Werch said they appreciate guidance from those who have already taken the classes.
“It is a great program to have because the Real Estate program in the Wisconsin School of Business is very unique, and it is difficult to find tutors elsewhere that can help in the way that the Graaskamp students are able to,” Wellisch said.
The program continues to expand as students recommend it to each other, but Kindle said he hopes to increase its outreach. Going forward, program managers plan to develop group study sessions that align with individual class exams, as well as visits to courses the tutoring covers.
Students looking for tutoring can drop by the Graaskamp Center (4440 Grainger Hall) and ask for Aaron, Aiden or Monika during the following times:
- Mondays from 9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m.
- Tuesdays from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m.
- Wednesdays from 9:30-11:30 a.m. and 12:30-4:30 p.m.
- Thursdays from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m.
- Fridays by appointment, email graaskamp@wsb.wisc.edu
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