[jacquesm]

Personally I like the Karate method: everybody teaches what they know all the time.

High requirements are a good way to get started though, that way you can set the bar high, guarantee good reviews and happy customers, then slowly relax the rules. The other way around wouldn't work nearly as well.

I'd say being a college student should allow you to help out high schoolers in the subject of your studies though, likely you are aware of the problems the high schoolers face better than anybody else, likewise high schoolers should be allowed to tutor grade schoolers.

There might be a nice 'certification' gig hidden in here somewhere.

[akharris]

The certification question is a really interesting one. We looked at a lot of other sites focused on various kinds of tutoring while building. We found that the ones that offered online "tests" for certification were producing false positives as to legitimate quality.

If I see a high schooler with certifications in 58 subjects, those certifications tend to lose their meaning. Likewise, if I have a friend with a Masters in English who taught writing at the college level fail your writing certification, it seems a little funny. That's part of the reason we took a different route.