A common perception amongst teachers is that tutoring is a shadowy underworld of amateurs that give bad advice, are poor communicators and lack knowledge of the curriculum. The fact is that some students need tutoring to help them get through their exams. How can teachers and tutors co-exist peacefully?
A great strength of current teachers is that they know the curriculum inside and out. They are constantly going over familiar material and generally know exactly what the examiners are looking for. Teachers can make great tutors. Unfortunately teachers are also very time-poor and generally the last thing they want to do after getting home from school and marking coursework is tutor somebody!
So teachers make the best tutors but generally don't have the time to tutor. Many schools also forbid teachers from tutoring their own pupils, or see tutoring as a slight on their own ability to teach (they think that if their student needs a tutor then they have failed to teach that person properly). This attitude towards tutoring tends to filter down from school management to the teaching staff.
In fact students need private tutors for many reasons - they may have ADHD and find it impossible to concentrate in a class environment; they may be struggling with issues at home and be distracted etc.
A private tutor can provide more than just academic tuition, they can be someone to talk to about problems both at school and at home.
The main problem with tutoring from the point of view of schools is the lack of regulation. It seems that anyone over 16 can be qualified to "tutor" someone. Attempts at regulating tutoring have failed in the past for numerous reasons. Maybe it's time that the schools themselves addressed the issue of private tutoring.
If schools take a more open approach to tutoring and can find a way to fit time for private tutoring into their teachers schedules then they will improve the quality of tutoring that their students are receiving, potentially develop a new revenue stream to bolster the school finances and remove the stigma that some teachers, and students develop about private tutoring.