Real help, done properly.
A tutor on TaskTutors will sit with you for as long as it takes, teach you the thing you are stuck on, and stay until you can do it on your own. What they will not do is produce the work you hand in. This page says exactly where that line falls, so nobody is surprised mid‑session.
We don’t do it for you.
Everything below is that one sentence, applied to the situations that actually come up.
The three tiers
Most policies give you a flat yes or no. That would be wrong in both directions, because the rule your school or university actually applies turns on one thing: whether the person who set the work gave permission. So there are three tiers, not two. This is the same from Grade 1 to a graduate degree.
No permission needed. Book as much of this as you like.
- The concept, taught properly.
I don’t understand integration by parts.
Explained from wherever your understanding actually stops. - The same type of problem, not your problem. Your tutor works an equivalent question they wrote themselves, then you go and do yours alone. This is the single most useful thing a tutor does and it is always allowed.
- Extra practice the tutor builds for you. Problem sets, mock questions, a practice test, and marking it afterwards.
- Released past exams and practice material your teacher, department or school has published for students to use.
- How to study. How to read a textbook, plan an essay, structure an argument, revise for a final, manage exam timing.
- Work you have already been graded on. A returned midterm is yours to learn from.
Ask your teacher or instructor first. Many classes permit tutoring here, from Grade 1 to a graduate degree. Some do not. Assume not until you know.
- Working through your own graded homework with a tutor, even when you do all the writing.
- Feedback on a draft you are going to submit.
- Debugging code you are going to submit.
- Talking through your own lab data or your own results.
- Your section of a group project.
we only worked through it togetheris not automatically a defence, and why the person who set the work has the final word.
How to check, in two lines. Email your teacher or instructor:
May I work with a tutor on this assignment?Keep the reply. Course outlines and class handbooks often answer it already.
Asking for any of this ends the session. Providing it ends the tutor’s account.
- Completing any part of what gets submitted. A question, a paragraph, a function, a table, a citation list.
- Handing over the answers to the questions being graded, in a session or over chat. Giving answers is completing the work.
- Any help while an assessment is open. A test, a quiz, a midterm, a final, a take‑home, an open‑book. One quick question counts.
- Writing or rewriting your text. A tutor may tell you a paragraph is weak. A tutor may not type into your document.
- Sharing course materials. Lecture slides, instructor notes, past papers that were not released, marked assignments, solution manuals.
- Logging in as you, or sitting anything under your name.
What your institution says
We did not invent this standard. Every school, college and university in Canada has its own version, and yours is the one that counts. Here is how one Calgary university words it, as an example of what they nearly all say.
Unauthorized assistance includes “cooperating, collaborating or otherwise giving or receiving assistance in completing academic activities without the Instructor’s permission.” University of Calgary, Student Academic Misconduct Policy
Read it closely. It does not say copying, and it does not say the tutor did the work. The standard is assistance in completing, and the thing that makes assistance authorised is permission from whoever set the work. That is the whole reason Tier 2 above is a question rather than a yes. It works the same way at every level: a Grade 4 teacher, a high-school department, a college programme and a university faculty each set their own rules. Where your teacher’s or instructor’s rules are stricter than ours, theirs win.
If you are a tutor
You will be asked. Usually politely, usually by someone under real pressure who does not think they are asking for anything unusual. Here is what to say.
It is not a refusal, it is a counter‑offer. It keeps you in Tier 1 no matter what their course rules say, and it is usually the session that gets you rebooked, because the student leaves able to do something they could not do an hour earlier.
🛡️ Your safe default
- Teach on a parallel problem. If you never touch the graded question, you are in Tier 1 and you never have to work out what their course allows.
- If you are a student yourself, helping someone else cheat is misconduct on your own record, at your own institution. The risk is not only theirs.
- Doing the work is the fastest way to lose a student. They come back for the mark, never for the teaching, and they leave the moment someone is cheaper.
- Tell us when it happens. Use the report button in session chat, or email us. You will never be penalised for reporting, and a report on file is what protects you if that student is later investigated.
📄 About materials
- Teach from your own work. Your notes, your problems, your worked examples.
- Never upload or send course slides, instructor notes, unreleased past papers, marked assignments or solution manuals, including from a course you took yourself.
- Aced the course last term? That is genuinely why students will pick you. Teach what you learned, not the file you kept.
- Files shared in session chat are deleted automatically the night of the session. That is a privacy measure, not a licence.
If you are a student or a parent
Three things worth knowing before you book.
🎓 The risk is yours
In a misconduct case it is the student who answers for it, not the tutor. Penalties at Canadian universities run from a mark of zero, through suspension, to expulsion and a revoked credential. A tutor who says no is the one looking after you.
❓ Check once, then relax
One message to your teacher or instructor settles Tier 2 for the whole term: may I work with a tutor on this? Keep the reply. Until you have it, ask your tutor to teach you on a practice question instead.
📅 Book earlier
Almost every request that crosses the line is a scheduling problem wearing a disguise. Booked a week out, Tier 1 teaching is enough. Booked at 11pm the night before, nothing legitimate is.
What happens if someone crosses it
Written down in advance, in order, so enforcement is never a mood. Where the conduct is serious we start part‑way up this ladder rather than at the bottom of it.
⚑ How to report
Every session chat has a Report button, and you can always email hello@tasktutors.ca. A person reads every one. Reporting in good faith never counts against you, as a tutor or as a student.
📜 What we keep
Booking records, payment records, session chat, and the timestamp of every agreement to this policy. If an institution makes a legitimate inquiry about a session booked here, we answer it honestly, within the limits of our Privacy Policy.
For instructors, departments and institutions
If you believe something on TaskTutors involves your course, whether that is your materials being shared, an assessment being completed, or a student of yours being helped across the line, write to us directly. You will get a person, not a form, and you will not need a lawyer to be taken seriously.
hello@tasktutors.ca with “academic integrity” in the subject line. We acknowledge within two business days.
Course material takedown
Tell us what the material is, where it appeared, and that you hold or represent the rights. We remove it and deal with the account that posted it. We do not require a formal notice first.
An inquiry about a session
We keep booking and payment records and will answer a legitimate inquiry honestly, within the limits of Canadian privacy law and our Privacy Policy.
Tell us your course rules
If your class, course or department permits less than Tier 2 allows, tell us and we will carry that instruction to the tutors who list it. Schools and school boards are as welcome to do this as universities.
Tutors who name your institution
Affiliations here are self‑declared and shown plainly as such. We claim no endorsement by any school or university, and we use no institution’s logo or branding.
Where responsibility sits
The honest version, because a policy that overclaims is worth less than one that does not.
We are a marketplace
Tutors on TaskTutors are independent. They are not our employees, and the tutoring agreement is between the tutor and the student or their parent. We set this standard, we enforce it, and we remove people who break it. We do not sit in the room.
Sessions are private
We do not record or monitor tutoring sessions, and we will not pretend to. That is a deliberate privacy choice, and it means enforcement depends on people telling us, which is why reporting matters so much here. The one exception is a large lecture-style group talk, which is recorded, and the host is told so before it starts.
This is not legal or academic advice
Nothing here is a ruling on your situation or a guarantee about how your institution will treat it. It is the standard we hold everyone on TaskTutors to, and we may update it. The date at the top of this page tells you when we last did.
Common questions
Help that still counts as yours
Book a tutor who will teach you the thing rather than hand you the answer, and walk into the exam able to do it alone.
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This page forms part of our Terms of Service. Every tutor and every student agrees to it before a session can be booked. It does not replace your own institution’s academic integrity policy, which always applies to you and may be stricter.
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