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Codakid
K12 Dive
Embedding tutoring into school day could offset COVID slide
Shawna De La Rosa
Jan. 6, 2021
Dive Brief:
Equal-access tutoring is emerging as an equity-based solution to
correct pandemic-related learning loss, District Administration
reports, noting the practice is considered an effective intervention
and can be scaled nationally, but is currently only widely available to
those who can afford private tutoring.
The first step in implementing a permanent tutoring system is to add 30
minutes to the school day, which would allow tutors to work with groups
of two to four students. Older students would tutor younger students,
and college students could become tutors as a work-study job.
Providing tutoring to the students in the nation's 20,000 lowest
performing schools would cost the federal government about $10 billion
a year, though some municipalities have already invested in this type
of intervention. Los Angeles Unified School District, for example, is
paying teachers to tutor students outside of school, and Maryland has
allocated $100 million to its tutoring programs.
Dive Insight:
Preliminary studies are showing while learning losses have not been as
steep as expected due to COVID-19 school closures, student growth in
math has still been stunted by the pandemic. Researchers also warn
learning losses could be steeper for the students who didn't show up
for testing, which was almost one in four.
High-dosage tutoring (HDT), which embeds tutoring for all students into
the school day, is one model gaining traction. It is personalized, with
specific student-to-tutor ratios of less than three-to-one. A recent
study found tutor-student ratios of more than one to three provide
little benefit. The HDT method is most successful when focusing on
math, an area where learning loss from school closures is expected to
be steep.
In 2010, the Houston Independent School District launched a 250-person
tutoring team at nine schools. The district was selective when it came
to the tutors, only hiring 25% of applicants and firing those who were
"a bad match for the program." Administrators walked around the groups
to observe the interactions. The model can be adapted to distance
learning requirements if schools remain closed or if they need to
re-close.
Approximately 12 states have implemented in-school, small group
tutoring. But the lessons need to closely align with curriculum in
order for them to be effective. Research shows the AmeriCorps-staffed
Minnesota Reading Corps program boosted higher-risk students' reading
levels by up to about one year.
Embedding tutoring into the school day also eliminates one of the
issues that have long been cited as plaguing this intervention:
elitism. Early in the pandemic, educators worried the rise of private
tutoring would further exacerbate inequity in education. One-on-one and
small-group tutoring is an effective learning intervention that could
be afforded to do the students who need it most but often can't afford
it themselves.
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