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03/01/2024. Tool
Stay Tuned… Get ready to learn more about your tutoring program’s alignment to high-impact standards and how you can improve through NSSA’s upcoming Tutoring Program Design Badge.  We are transitioning from the Validated Assessment to a new Badging Process that shows how well a tutoring program’s design aligns with fundamental Tutoring Quality Standards. 

02/20/2023. Tool
Program Design

02/19/2023. Tool
Adapt this document to advocate for your HEI’s support of a high-impact tutoring partnership with a local K-12 district. What is High-Impact Tutoring and how do higher education institutions partner with school districts?

02/19/2023. Tool
The purpose of this guidance is to provide HEIs with ideas for how to recruit university students to serve as tutors. These ideas are curated from current practices shared by HEI tutoring programs in local K-12 districts. Depending on the population of students you intend to recruit, some of these ideas may be more relevant to your context than others. 

02/19/2023. Tool
Recommended Division of Functions Across HEI Departments Aligned to TQIS Quality Standards 

02/19/2023. Tool
The purpose of this guidance is to provide HEI partners with ideas for how to engage K-12 students more broadly with the HEI community.  This list is curated from practices shared by current HEI tutoring programs in local K-12 districts.  Depending on the design of your program and your HEI campus, some of these ideas may be more relevant to your context than others. 

02/19/2023. Tool
Once the partnership between the HEI and K-12 schools is established, regular meetings between the HEI and K-12 schools ensure that the partnership remains healthy and improves over time.

02/19/2023. Tool
The purpose of this guidance is to provide HEIs seeking opportunities to partner with a school district with information about how to identify districts interested in and/or already offering tutoring services.

02/19/2023. Tool
Use these ten multiple-choice questions to design your tutoring program’s Model Dimensions. Model Dimensions are the specific design choices a new tutoring program makes at the outset. Each choice you make should have a clear rationale supported by your Landscape Analysis and be made in consultation with your school district partner and internal task force/team. 

02/19/2023. Tool
This document outlines costs and funding sources needed to develop and/or grow a tutoring partnership between your HEI and a local K-12 school district. The amount and type of funding needed will be based on the model of your tutoring program. Use this cost calculator and HEI-specific budgeting template to understand your projected costs.

02/12/2023. Tool
The program profiles below provide a few examples of the variety of ways in which a HEI - District tutoring partnership can be designed and implemented.  Additional program profiles may be found in Saga's Leveraging the Federal Work-Study Program for P-12 Tutoring. If you would like to suggest a program to be profiled, please email info@studentsupportaccelerator.org.

08/26/2021. Tool
While research shows that high-impact tutoring programs consistently result in student learning gains, the benefits of tutoring can extend beyond academic learning. For instance, students may come to see more value in the subject, develop a connection with a caring adult, or even enjoy school more. Tutors also stand to benefit from their experiences instructing and interacting with students. Administering student and tutor surveys provides an opportunity to capture a broader scope of outcomes than test scores or grades.

07/29/2021. Tool
Overview: Why are continuous improvement systems critical to sustainability? All tutoring programs and especially new tutoring programs need improvement. Continuous improvement systems allow you to gather, act on and share the information needed to reach and exceed program goals and inform and build support from stakeholders.

07/29/2021. Tool
Overview: How do you identify causes and solutions to poor enrollment or attendance? This section offers solutions to common challenges concerning student enrollment and attendance. Use the recommendations proactively to establish systems early: enrollment and attendance are non-negotiable necessities for a tutoring program to succeed, and they do not happen automatically.

07/29/2021. Tool
What is a District Landscape Analysis? A Landscape Analysis outlines the strengths, resources, and needs of a particular school district. It provides a framework for designing a service and ensuring that it is embedded directly in the needs of the district.

07/28/2021. Tool
Overview: How can districts and schools work together to schedule tutoring into the school day? Once you have identified the schools where tutoring will happen and selected the students who will receive it, you are ready to tackle the logistical challenge of scheduling when and where your program’s tutoring sessions will take place.

07/28/2021. Tool
Overview: Why should you create guidance for which students receive tutoring? All students can benefit from high-impact tutoring, but you will probably need to prioritize which students receive this tutoring, at least in the short-run. Once you have chosen a focus area (subject and grade level) and identified partner schools for your program, the next step is to select which students at each school will receive tutoring. The district should create overall guidelines for schools to make these decisions.

07/28/2021. Tool
Overview: Why should you be selective about your program’s schools? Choosing schools whose communities are fully invested in your program’s success will help you optimize your model more quickly. Prioritizing the schools whose students need tutoring most will ensure that your program can make a meaningful impact at any scale. What criteria should you consider when selecting your program’s schools? Does this school need this program?

07/28/2021. Tool
Implement High-Impact Tutoring Overview: Why should you be selective about your program’s schools? What criteria should you consider when selecting your program’s schools? Selecting Students Overview: Why should you create guidance for which students receive tutoring? What criteria should you consider when selecting students? Scheduling Sessions

07/28/2021. Tool
Overview: Why is tutor training and support important? Tutor training is required to fill gaps between your selection criteria and your ideal tutor’s qualities. While the level of training required depends on tutor experience and student-tutor ratio, pre-service training alone will not be sufficient. All tutor types perform better with direction and coaching.

07/28/2021. Tool
Overview: How do you build an effective and diverse cohort of tutors? Your tutors are your program’s most important asset. To find the best tutors for the role, you must clearly define required qualifications and ideal qualities, prioritize them based on your district context and program model, and design an intentional recruitment and selection strategy to build a diverse cohort of tutors that will meet your scale goals while remaining within your tutoring program’s budget.

07/28/2021. Tool
Overview: What does Model Design involve? Model Design involves several steps including understanding the needs of your district by conducting a District Landscape Analysis< developing a logic model to map how your program will address these needs and then making a series of consistent and coherent choices along various model design dimensions based on this information. Conducting a District Landscape Analysis is covered in Section 1: Lay the Foundation.

07/28/2021. Tool
Overview: What does grow your own tutoring program mean? You may opt to build a new program from the ground up, leveraging the existing systems in your district and the talent pool in your community. Both with regard to program design and implementation, when a district grows its own program it has more choices to make; with this greater autonomy comes greater control over outcomes, but also greater risk of implementing ineffective practices.

07/28/2021. Tool
Overview: Why is it important to collaborate with your tutoring provider? Your district’s degree of collaboration with a provider will depend on the program model and the level of logistics and support needed from the district to implement the program. Ideally, a tutoring provider will operate as a strategic partner, supporting the district to continuously reflect and improve upon the tutoring program.

07/28/2021. Tool
Overview: Why is it important to have a contract? Most districts will require formal contracts to be in place before work with a provider can begin, but even if your district does not, an agreement or Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) should be in place before work begins. This helps you and your provider align your expectations and incentives at the outset, preemptively solving problems before they arise. Before drawing up your contract, check your district’s policies for any limitations on the following:

07/28/2021. Tool
Overview: How do you plan for issuing an RFP? An RFP may be required depending on the scale of your program and the regulations in your district. If so, understanding the approval process is critical. Some districts may require approval from the school board, while others may allow district employees to sign off.