AI Tutor Matching
How Tuitionable's matching questionnaire and personalized recommendation rails score and rank tutors using a transparent rule-based engine, with match scores and why-you-match reasons.
On this page
- Overview
- Taking the matching questionnaire
- What inputs drive the ranking
- How budget is scored
- How your goal is interpreted
- How preferred time is scored
- Match scores & tie-breakers
- The “why you match” reason
- Personalized recommendation rails
- How “Best 3 picks” ranks
- Reason badges on the rail
- Cards show real availability
- AI search expansion (separate feature)
- Troubleshooting & tips
- Related pages
Overview
Tuitionable includes two complementary ways to surface the right tutor without you scrolling through every profile: a short matching questionnaire and a set of personalized recommendation rails on your tutor-search page.
This page is for students. It explains what inputs drive the ranking, how match scores are calculated, what the “why you match” reasons mean, and where each surface appears. It covers the public Find a Tutor questionnaire and the signed-in /find-tutors rails (Best 3 picks for you and Tutors you’ve worked with).
Transparent, rule-based scoring. Despite the name, AI Tutor Matching is not a black-box model. It is a deterministic, rule-based scoring engine: every point a tutor earns comes from a fixed, published weight that you can see on this page. The same answers always produce the same ranking.
Taking the matching questionnaire
The questionnaire is open to everyone — you do not need an account to take it. It asks five quick questions and then returns your top matches.
| # | Question | Field | Choices |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | What do you want to learn? | subject_id | Any active subject in the catalog |
| 2 | What’s your current level? | level | Beginner · Intermediate · Advanced |
| 3 | What’s your main goal? | goal | Exam Preparation · Conversation / Fluency · Homework Help · Personal Growth |
| 4 | What’s your hourly budget? | budget | A number in (SGD) (optional) |
| 5 | When do you prefer to learn? | time | Mornings · Afternoons · Evenings · Weekends |
After you submit, Tuitionable shows up to 6 matches on a results page, ranked by fit. Each card carries a coloured “NN% match” badge and a short reason. You can click Retake the questionnaire at any time to change your answers.
The budget field is optional. Leave it blank to rank without a price ceiling. Every answer is optional to the scoring engine — a missing answer simply doesn’t contribute points and never blocks results.
What inputs drive the ranking
The engine starts every tutor at zero and adds points for each dimension that matches your answers. Subjects carry the most weight, followed by budget and level. The weights are fixed:
| Dimension | Max points | How a tutor earns it |
|---|---|---|
| Subject | 35 | The tutor teaches the exact subject you chose. |
| Budget | 25 | The tutor’s hourly rate fits your budget (see the falloff below). |
| Level | 15 | The tutor lists your chosen level among the student levels they teach. |
| Goal | 10 | The tutor’s profile suits your goal (see the goal mapping below). |
| Language | 10 | The tutor speaks at least one language you selected. |
| Time | 5 | The tutor has recurring availability in your preferred part of the day. |
A tutor who matches your subject, budget, and level is already scoring around 70 before any other signal is folded in.
How budget is scored
Budget is not all-or-nothing. If a tutor’s rate is at or below your budget, they earn most of the 25 points, and the further below your budget they sit, the more of those points they get. If a tutor is over budget but within 25% of it, they still earn a small fraction of the points so the results aren’t limited to only the cheapest tutors. Tutors more than 25% over budget earn nothing on this dimension.
How your goal is interpreted
There is no separate “goal” field on tutor profiles, so the engine reads your goal against signals tutors already publish:
| Your goal | Counts as a match when the tutor… |
|---|---|
| Exam Preparation | lists at least one exam they prepare students for |
| Conversation / Fluency | has a conversational teaching style |
| Homework Help | has a patient or structured teaching style |
| Personal Growth | has a patient or conversational teaching style |
How preferred time is scored
Each time choice maps to an hour window: Mornings (6–12), Afternoons (12–17), Evenings (17–22). Weekends looks at Saturday and Sunday rather than a clock window. A tutor scores on this dimension only if they have a recurring, unblocked availability slot inside that window. A tutor who hasn’t set up recurring availability simply earns no time points.
Match scores & tie-breakers
The dimension points above are added together, then a few small soft boosts are applied. These never decide a match on their own — they exist to break ties intelligently between tutors who score similarly on the things you asked for.
| Soft boost | Points |
|---|---|
| Average rating of 4.5 or higher | +3 |
| Instant-book enabled | +2 |
| Currently online | +2 |
| Featured tutor | +2 |
The final number is capped at 100, so the badge always reads as a clean percentage from 0 to 100. Tutors are then sorted highest-first and the top six are shown.
Who is eligible. Only approved tutors enter the ranking. If you picked a subject, the candidate pool is first narrowed to tutors who teach that exact subject, then scored. The questionnaire matches on the exact subject you selected, so very closely related subjects are not automatically pulled in — if results feel thin, try the main tutor search, which broadens related subjects.
The “why you match” reason
Every match shows one short reason next to its score so you understand why it ranked where it did. The engine picks the strongest matching dimension and surfaces it. Subject is checked first, then budget, then level and language, in the order the points were earned.
| Reason you may see | What it means |
|---|---|
| Teaches your subject | This tutor teaches the subject you chose — the highest-weighted match. |
| Fits your budget | Their hourly rate is at or below the budget you entered. |
| Fits your level | They teach students at the level you selected. |
| Speaks your language | They speak at least one language you chose. |
| Top-rated match for your search | Shown when no single answer dominated — usually a strong all-round or highly rated tutor. |
Personalized recommendation rails
When you’re signed in and open your tutor-search home at /find-tutors with no filters applied (the first, unfiltered page), Tuitionable adds two personalized rails above the regular results:
- Best 3 picks for you — the three tutors that best fit your profile and history, each with a reason badge and the next few open slots.
- Tutors you’ve worked with — tutors you completed a session with in the last 90 days and rated 4 stars or higher, most recent first.
These rails appear only on the clean home view. The moment you type a query or apply a filter (subject, price, rating, language, and so on), the rails step aside and you see standard, filtered search results instead.
The more you tell us, the sharper the picks. The rails read your declared preferences — subjects of interest, budget range, goal, and preferred times — from your student profile, and blend them with your booking history. Filling in those preferences makes “Best 3 picks for you” far more relevant.
How “Best 3 picks” ranks
The rail scores a pool of top-rated approved tutors across several weighted factors and keeps the three highest. The signals it blends are:
| Factor | What it rewards |
|---|---|
| Subject affinity | Tutors who teach the subjects you declared on your profile rank above those matching only your past bookings. |
| Budget fit | Full credit when the rate sits inside your declared budget range; no credit when it’s over; neutral when you haven’t set a budget. |
| Preferred time | Credit when the tutor has an upcoming slot in your preferred part of the day (morning / afternoon / evening). |
| Goal fit | Credit when your declared goal lines up with a tutor who teaches your declared subject. |
| Would-book-again | A strong boost for tutors you previously marked you’d book again. |
| History | Tutors you’ve booked recently rank higher, with the boost fading over about 30 days. |
| Rating & experience | Higher average rating and more completed lessons add a steady, smaller lift. |
The rail also excludes tutors you rated poorly: any tutor you gave a 2-star (or lower) review, or two or more reviews of 3 stars or lower, is removed from your picks entirely.
Reason badges on the rail
Like the questionnaire, each pick shows the single strongest reason it earned its place — for example You’d book again, You booked recently, Matches your goal subjects, In your budget, Highly rated, or Top-ranked for you. If a tutor has an open slot within the next 24 hours and the reason was otherwise generic, the badge becomes Available soon to flag the urgency.
Cards show real availability
Each card on both rails surfaces the tutor’s next open slots (looking up to 7 days ahead) plus light context signals such as how many times they were booked this week and how many slots remain today. Slots are computed using the tutor’s default session length.
AI search expansion (separate feature)
You may also see an AI Tutor Matching chip on the search hero of your /find-tutors page. This is a distinct, optional helper, not the rule-based questionnaire. You can type a request in plain words — for example “help passing my calculus final” — and the search expands it into related academic keywords so nearby tutors also surface. When it expands a search, the chip shows the extra topics it also searched.
Troubleshooting & tips
| Symptom | What to do |
|---|---|
| The questionnaire says “No tutors matched your filters” | Widen your budget or pick a different subject, then retake the questionnaire. The subject step matches exactly, so a niche pick may have few approved tutors. |
| Match scores look lower than expected | That’s normal — a tutor earns points only for the answers you gave. Answering more questions (level, language, time) lifts scores for tutors that fit. |
| “Best 3 picks for you” isn’t showing | The rails appear only on the unfiltered first page. Clear any search query or filter, and make sure you’re signed in. The section also stays hidden until enough eligible tutors are available. |
| Picks feel generic | Add your subjects of interest, budget range, goal, and preferred times to your student profile — declared preferences carry the most weight. |
| A tutor you disliked keeps appearing elsewhere | The rails exclude tutors you rated 2 stars or lower; leaving an honest review keeps your picks clean. |
| No AI matching chip on the search hero | That feature is admin-controlled and may be off. The questionnaire and rails still work without it. |
Related pages
- Finding a Tutor — the full search directory with filters, sorting, and facets.
- Tutor Profiles & Favorites — explore a tutor in depth and save them to your wishlist.
- Booking a Session — turn a match into a confirmed lesson.
- Reviews & Ratings — how your ratings shape future recommendations.