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06/05/2024. Article
Less than a third of Colorado eighth-graders score proficiently in math. So, Colorado has invested heavily in high-impact tutoring programs — $20 million allocated in federal and state dollars since the pandemic. Colorado was also one of five states to get a $1 million grant from Accelerate, a nonprofit that aims to make
06/04/2024. Article
Tutoring is a win-win job for college and K-12 students, but the question remains how best to connect college students who need these jobs with the paid tutoring positions available. In a recent working paper with colleagues, we report on a randomized controlled trial that tested whether highlighting the different benefits of a tutoring job can drive changes in tutor applications and employment. We partnered with Grand Valley State University (GVSU) to recruit paid tutors for a campus initiative started in 2020 to support Michigan K-12 students. Tutoring at GVSU was not only a paid position—it was a highly paid position on campus. Tutors could earn up to $17.70 per hour, the highest rate in the GVSU student hourly wage range and well above the state minimum wage at the time of the study ($10.10).
05/31/2024. Article
Regardless of the potential hiccups along the way, data has shown that colleges and universities are beginning to tap more into Federal Work-Study funds to hire tutors, said Nancy Waymack, director of research partnerships and policy at Stanford University’s National Student Support Accelerator, a nonprofit research organization that promotes high-impact tutoring in schools.
For Waymack, it’s refreshing to see students earn pay for tutoring considering the role has historically been viewed as a volunteering opportunity.
“Using Work-Study, using AmeriCorps funds, other federal resources or resources that come from other places to pay tutors just opens up the field a lot more for many different students who otherwise might have been doing another job on campus,” Waymack said. “And they wouldn’t have that opportunity to be in a school, work with kids, and see educators who are teaching every day that they might want to emulate somewhere down the road.”
04/10/2024. Article
I spent the past year visiting Jackson and eight other schools across three states and the District of Columbia to understand how and why their successful tutoring programs work and the challenges they’ve had to navigate. Our FutureEd study also included dozens of conversations with educators, school district leaders, providers, researchers and others who have turned to tutoring to combat learning loss after COVID.
04/10/2024. Article
Educators are eager to launch high-impact tutoring, however, they also reported that improvements were needed to ensure tutors focused on the interventions most needed by students.
Most K12 leaders would agree that high-dosage tutoring is now a key part of instruction. Most would also note difficulties with finding adequate space and funding, hiring high-quality tutors and encouraging students to attend.
Those hurdles and, more importantly, the solutions are explained by Stanford University’s National Student Support Accelerator in a new study of a large urban district and a charter system. The strategies identified should help administrators scale successful tutoring programs to help more students stay on track, the report’s authors contend.
04/02/2024. Article
Those efforts have helped pay dividends for attendance, too. In the second study, released earlier this month, researchers with Stanford University’s National Student Support Accelerator found that students are 7 percent less likely to be absent on days they have scheduled tutoring sessions. The study, conducted over the 2022-23 school year, examined absenteeism rates of 4,478 students in 141 schools in the District of Columbia.
“There are lots of reasons why students are absent. Being disengaged in school is one reason,” said Nancy Waymack, the director of partnerships and policy at the NSSA."Tutoring is one way that students can have one more meaningful relationship in school. Tutoring can be one tool to move the needle in the right direction.”
03/12/2024. Article
INCREASING ACCESS TO HIGH-IMPACT TUTORING
Over the past few years, finding consensus around the most effective strategies and interventions to address post-COVID learning recovery has largely been elusive. But there is widespread agreement that high-impact, or high-dosage, tutoring holds tremendous promise.
Ideally, programs include small groups of no more than three to four students. They meet at least three times a week with a professionally trained tutor, during school hours. In addition to the high-quality materials used in the sessions, students benefit from meeting with the same tutor every week.
02/27/2024. Article
Students were less likely to be absent on days when they had a scheduled tutoring session, according to study by National Student Support Accelerator at Stanford University.
PALO ALTO, C.A., March 1, 2024 – Schools nationwide are grappling with significant challenges related to student absenteeism. In response, D.C. schools along with many other states and school districts have implemented strategies ranging from texting interventions to home visits. D.C. schools have also prioritized mitigating pandemic-related learning losses through the widespread adoption of high-impact tutoring programs. High-impact tutoring seeks to develop strong relationships between students and their tutors in order to increase student motivation and engagement in their academic coursework, but could also benefit attendance.
01/31/2024. Article
Once CEO Matt Pasternack, a former teacher who moved into education technology, acknowledges that’s expensive and labor-intensive. He estimates CMS would have spent $200,000 for this year’s pilot, which involves 400 children. But Stanford’s National Student Support Accelerator, which specializes in research into tutoring, has a grant from Accelerate to cover this year’s costs for participating schools in CMS, Nashville and South Bend, Indiana.
01/18/2024. Article
High-dosage tutoring, sometimes called “high-impact” or “high-intensity” tutoring, is one of the few school-based interventions with demonstrated significant positive effects on math and reading achievement. Yet high-dosage tutoring is a very specific form of tutoring that must meet specific criteria:
One-on-one or small-group sessions with no more than four students per tutor
Use of high-quality materials that align with classroom content
Three tutoring sessions per week—at minimum—each lasting at least 30 minutes
Sessions held during school hours
Students meeting with the same tutor each session
Professionally trained tutors who receive ongoing support and coaching
01/04/2024. Article
Susanna Loeb is named to the 2024 RHSU Edu-Scholar Public Influence Rankings, recognizing the 200 university-based scholars who had the biggest influence on educational practice and policy last year.
For the full list and to learn more about the rankings, visit The 2024 RHSU Edu-Scholar Public Influence Rankings.
12/22/2023. Article
High-dosage tutoring programs have expanded significantly, with nearly 40 percent of schools now using individual and small-group tutoring with trained teachers or tutors four or five days a week. This approach has been shown to boost student learning, but it can also be expensive. A new study by the National Student Support Accelerator at Stanford University suggests virtual tutoring could be a less-costly option, if it remains as intensive and rigorous as in-person tutoring.
12/13/2023. Article
Thankfully, states and districts aren’t sitting on their hands in the face of learning loss. Supported by billions of dollars of federal funds, many have invested heavily in tutoring programs that promise to help struggling children overcome the challenges imposed by past school closures and virtual instruction. The question is whether those efforts work for enough students to justify their cost — and according to data generated by the National Student Support Accelerator, a Stanford initiative devoted to studying the effects of tutoring, there is reason for hope.
12/07/2023. Article
Transformative change in education often begins with a powerful story. Increasingly, high-impact tutoring is that story, where students find both significant academic success and personal confidence in their abilities. Rhyne Richards—a 6th-grade student in Washington, DC.—met several times each week with a tutor, Ms. Burns, to overcome math challenges. Rhyne’s journey speaks volumes. “I get distracted a lot [in class],” Rhyne admitted. “But when I’m with Ms. Burns, I learn a lot; a lot more than I knew last year.” It’s a testament to the remarkable impact of intensive, one-on-one tutoring. “I’m proud of myself,” Rhyne continued. “Before, I didn’t really know math like I do now. But now I can do it myself. I want to be the smartest person in the world.” Rhyne’s regained confidence in math and optimism for the future epitomize the profound evidence for and influence of intensive, relationship-based, individualized instruction—it is a narrative we must tirelessly work to replicate and scale.
12/05/2023. Article
Stanford’s National Student Support Accelerator suggests various tutor trainings along with online pre-service trainings such as Saga Coach. The training level of tutors also impacts tutor payment with some models proposing payments of $20 per hour for non-professionals and payments of up to $50 per hour for teachers and professional tutors.
10/31/2023. Article
Intensive, high-dose tutoring can boost early reading skills, even in a virtual format, according to a new experimental study.
Researchers from the National Student Support Accelerator at Stanford University tracked the reading progress of about 2,000 K-2 students in a dozen Texas charter schools. Half of the students were randomly assigned to attend class normally, while half received intensive remote tutoring for part of the school day, in small groups, through the nonprofit group OnYourMark, which serves K-2 students in seven states.
09/27/2023. Article
Districts across the nation use Multi-Tiered Systems of Support (MTSS) to target appropriate supports for each student. High-impact tutoring is the most effective research-backed academic support – consistently demonstrating from six months to over two years of learning gains for students across grade levels and content areas in a single year of tutoring.
Districts that have chosen to integrate high-impact tutoring with MTSS are finding that embedding this highly effective support into the fabric of their schools improves student outcomes, reduces implementation challenges, improves instructional coherence, and streamlines operations.
09/27/2023. Article
According to the U.S. Department of Education’s research arm, high-dose tutoring is the most effective—though often the most expensive.
The National Student Support Accelerator, a Stanford University center that studies effective tutoring, finds that effective high-dose tutoring programs require:
Tutoring integrated into the school day to increase tutor-teacher coordination and avoid transportation or time problems for students.
Targeting students based on academic need rather than requiring parents to opt into services.
Budgeting services for at least three to five days a week for extended periods of time.
Differentiated tutoring based on particular student needs and skills.
Data-gathering and progress-monitoring, particularly when schools work with outside tutoring providers.
09/27/2023. Article
With research showing that far fewer students took advantage of online tutoring than districts expected, the outcomes-based model is one way to ensure districts use public funds wisely. “In education, we can pay for things a long time before we realize no children are participating in it,” Miller said.
06/21/2023. Article
We need your help to provide an open-access Tutor Training Resource Library and develop new tutor training materials!
Would you be interested in making your tutor training publicly accessible through NSSA’s website?
If so, please complete this Tutor Training Resource Library Interest Form. Sharing your training materials is a great way to build awareness of your tutoring program and contribute to the field. You can also indicate interest in setting up a call to discuss this project further through this form.
05/31/2023. Article
Developing and staffing the kind of tutoring that research has shown is most effective—often referred to as high quality, or high-impact tutoring—is complex, time-consuming, and expensive. Tutors meet with students at least three times a week, in small groups or one-on-one. Work should be targeted to a specific subject and aligned to high-quality curriculum, and should develop strong tutor-tutee relationships.
“High-impact tutoring is not homework help. They’re not sporadically dropping in,” said Carly Robinson, a senior researcher at Stanford University’s Graduate School of Education who works with the National Student Support Accelerator, a group promoting research-based tutoring programs.
05/18/2023. Article
“The truth is that there are a lot of scabbed knees and bruises in this work,” Borders, who oversees the state’s tutoring effort, said at a conference held last week at Stanford University about the future of tutoring. “Not going to sugar coat this, guys. It’s hard work.”
Early in the pandemic, experts identified high-dosage tutoring — the kind that’s offered multiple times per week, in small groups, with a consistent tutor — as a potentially successful strategy for helping students plug learning gaps. But more than two years into a national push to expand the reach of tutoring, many schools are still struggling with basics, like how to staff and schedule their programs.
04/27/2023. Article
Of all academic interventions, so-called “high-dosage” tutoring has shown the most evidence of helping students gain academic ground quickly.
Susanna Loeb, the founder and executive director of the National Student Support Accelerator, studies how schools can use and scale up intensive tutoring, which involves one-on-one situations or very small groups meeting at least 30 minutes, three or more times a week.
Loeb, who is also a professor and the director of the education policy initiative at the Graduate School of Education at Stanford University, spoke with Education Week about what goes into effective tutoring.
04/25/2023. Article
High-quality tutoring is one of the most effective educational interventions we have – but we need both humans and technology for it to work. In a standing-room-only session, GSE Professor Susanna Loeb, a faculty lead at the Stanford Accelerator for Learning, spoke alongside school district superintendents on the value of high-impact tutoring. The most important factors in effective tutoring, she said, are (1) the tutor has data on specific areas where the student needs support, (2) the tutor has high-quality materials and training, and (3) there is a positive, trusting relationship between the tutor and student. New technologies, including AI, can make the first and second elements much easier – but they will never be able to replace human adults in the relational piece, which is crucial to student engagement and motivation.
04/13/2023. Article
Pearl, the leading research-based tutor management platform, announced today insights from its inaugural Community
04/04/2023. Article
A two-year grant of $1,000,000 to the National Student Support Accelerator (NSSA), a program devoted to translating research on how tutoring can benefit students into action. This grant will strengthen the high-impact tutoring ecosystem by supporting NSSA in disseminating research on what makes tutoring programs effective to state and local education agencies, ensuring that evidence-based tutoring reaches the students who need it most.
03/27/2023. Article
With “proper supports, such as good materials and coaching, they can be excellent tutors,” said Stanford professor Susanna Loeb, who founded the National Student Support Accelerator to expand access to high-quality tutoring.
03/20/2023. Article
Are you a college or university leader looking to improve opportunities for your students?
Or maybe you are a district leader looking to partner with a college or university to provide tutoring for your students?
The National Student Support Accelerator’s High Impact Tutoring: Higher Education Institution Playbook supports higher education institutions in partnering with school districts to offer high-impact tutoring services.