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Integrating technology into the classroom involves more than just adding gadgets and software; it’s about creating a dynamic learning environment where students are actively engaged and teachers can teach more effectively. This journey requires collaboration among technology teams, instructional coaches and educators.
Recently, EdSurge spoke with three educational leaders from Bourbonnais Elementary School District 53 in Illinois about their experiences with and strategies for using technology to enrich classroom environments. Caitlin Smith, the director of technology, has been in the K-12 educational technology space for 10 years. As the technology integration and support specialist, Kari Moulton brings 18 years of education experience to her work with teachers and staff to support technology integration. Amber Skeate, starting her 20th year in the classroom, serves on the technology committee and as technology leader at Alan B. Shepard Elementary School.
Caitlin SmithTechnology plays a crucial role in classroom success, but integrating new tools can be challenging. Smith emphasizes the importance of addressing the big picture. "Being at the district level, I have to look at the challenges that hinder more than just one user," she explains. "I start by looking at where we have had the most issues coming from the end users (staff and students) or if the administration notices gaps in student growth." Smith’s approach ensures that the technology chosen benefits the entire district.
When evaluating new technology, Smith places a priority on solutions that are both easy to implement and cost-effective. "We discuss this in our technology leadership meetings and set up trials for each tech leader to test the technology," she says. This thorough vetting process ensures that the selected tools will effectively address the district’s needs. "Having both a technology integration specialist and a technology leadership committee allows the district to implement new technology throughout the year with the input of teachers along with my own staff’s recommendations," Smith adds, highlighting the importance of collaborative decision-making in tech integration.
Kari MoultonOnce new technology is selected, rolling it out successfully is the next challenge. Moulton plays a key role in this phase. "We do whatever it takes to support our teachers," Moulton shares. Her team provides a monthly newsletter with information about new tools, creates instructional videos and offers one-on-one training sessions. Her proactive support helps teachers feel confident and prepared to use new technology in their classrooms. Additionally, Moulton meets with new teachers at the start of the school year to give them an overview of the technology they will be using, ensuring that they are ready to integrate it into their teaching from day one.
“Having a supportive edtech company ensures that the adoption of the new tools is smooth,” Moulton adds, underscoring the importance of reliable vendor support in the tech adoption process. She points to Bourbonnais' implementation of Vivi, the classroom engagement and campus communications solution as an example. “Vivi made [our technology] rollout unique because they sent us two boxes to demo for eight weeks. This allowed us to have various teachers at all grade levels test out the solution and give us feedback.”
“One beneficial way that edtech companies have supported the tools that we have adopted is great communication and support,” shares Moulton. She highlights Vivi's exemplary support: “I have monthly meetings with my [customer success manager] to check in on how things are going, what is working and what we might need to troubleshoot. They also give out [usage] data. With budgets affecting a majority of schools, having the data to back up the usage of the tool is very important and beneficial in determining the future use of the tool.”
Amber SkeateIn the classroom, technology can transform instruction and student engagement. "Technology is a huge part of my classroom atmosphere,” says Skeate. The students each have a laptop and can use approved apps for independent work during math and reading, allowing them to work at their instructional level while Skeate meets with small groups. Technology is also used to present concepts to the class. "The way I project my slide presentations, lessons and videos wouldn't happen without Vivi,” shares Skeate.
The ability to actively participate in lessons through technology fosters a more engaging and interactive classroom environment. “The students ask me every day if they are going to use the Vivi App so that they can be the teacher for the lesson,” Skeate excitedly states. Vivi's wireless screen mirroring allows the teacher to pass control of the classroom display to the students to share how they answer problems or write a word.
And engagement is not the only benefit. “Technology has been a lifesaver when it comes to honing in on instructional levels of all students through particular reading and math apps,” explains Skeate. In addition, technology can be a time-saver for teachers. "Vivi's Play Content feature allows me to line up all the videos I need for the day,” notes Skeate, which saves her time she would otherwise spend searching for materials. This efficiency enables her to focus more on teaching and less on administrative tasks, ultimately benefiting her students.
The collaboration between district leaders, tech coaches and teachers at Bourbonnais showcases how technology can be seamlessly integrated to create engaging and efficient classroom environments. By focusing on comprehensive training and ongoing support while implementing interactive tools like Vivi, these educators are transforming their teaching and enhancing student learning experiences. The positive impact of technology on the instructional experience and classroom dynamics is evident, demonstrating that when implemented thoughtfully, technology can be a powerful tool in education.
Strategies for collaborative technology integration
For district-level staff: Carry out a proactive needs assessment / Carry out multi-level evaluations
For school-level staff: Provide multifaceted teacher support / Provide training geared toward new teachers / Seek edtech partner collaboration
For classroom-level staff: Provide tech-infused instruction / Offer student choice and control
See for yourself how Vivi transforms communication, boosts classroom engagement and simplifies IT management. Learn more at Vivi.io.
© Image Credit: SeventyFour / Shutterstock
Crisis. Fatalistic. Overwhelming.
That’s how some experts say the current national conversation about youth mental health is framed — and counter to its goal, that lens is hurting the ability to find solutions that help adolescents better weather mental health struggles.
They spoke during a media briefing on youth mental health organized by the FrameWorks Institute, a nonprofit that studies how people think about social issues.
One of the biggest challenges to making communities that are overall better for youth mental health is the very way the issue is talked about, says Nat Kendall-Taylor, CEO of the FrameWorks Institute and a psychological anthropologist.
Conversations tend to focus on how individual choices students make can impact their mental health, he says, rather than on how systemic problems and the environments where teens live contribute to stress on adolescents. They also tend to be fatalistic and focus on the crisis nature of the problem, Kendall-Taylor adds, and paint teens as a kind of “other” social group that’s detached from their communities.
These factors form a “toxic trio” that causes people to feel as though the problem is insurmountable, he explains, and then tune out. That creates a challenge in getting people supportive of changes, and use of public resources, for teen mental health support.
“It’s become a culture war issue, it’s become an existential problem,” Kendall-Taylor says, “and the interesting thing is the way in which that crisis- and urgency-focused narrative really gives no space and has no room for solutions.”
Andrew Fuligni is a psychology professor and leads the Adolescent Development Lab at the University of California, Los Angeles.
Science’s understanding of the adolescent brain is much different than it was 10 years ago, he says, and what the teen mind needs is connection, discovery and exploration. The motivation and rewards system is highly active, pumping out higher levels of dopamine than those seen in earlier childhood or in adulthood.
“It energizes our motivational region so we can explore the world and find not just how we can fit into the family but into the social world, community and so on,” Fuligni says. “We are designed to take risks during the adolescent years so we can learn. It’s important for adolescents to have those risks in safe and supportive ways, whether in school or the community, so they can find out how they can make a good contribution to the world around them.”
Fuligni says the public is still underestimating the importance of sleep, which is critical to the brain’s development, to adolescent mental health. Current evidence suggests there’s a far greater connection between quality sleep and mental health, he explains, than with another factor frequently named the root problem — social media usage.
“Many scientists believe that the focus on social media has led us to not pay attention to these other critical factors that may be driving these kinds of things,” Fuligni says.
But teens don’t necessarily control whether their environment is set up for a good night’s sleep, Fuligni says. How much noise or light pollution is present, or whether there’s tension at home, are all factors that can impact whether adolescents get sufficient rest.
“Sleep also shows very significant inequalities in American society,” he says. “When we look at economic inequalities, ethnic inequalities, sleep will follow every aspect of inequality across the nation. Light pollution, overcrowding, when you look at work schedules of parents, these will all drive poorer sleep within the household.”
Kendall-Taylor says that one solution the FrameWork Institute recommends to address public disengagement around youth mental health is changing the framing from an individual problem to one that focuses on how our environment shapes us.
Educating people on how adolescent development works is key to getting buy-in for addressing issues that will improve teen well-being, he adds. There’s likewise a need to steer conversations around youth mental health from crisis to solutions, with more talking about what positive and resilient mental health experiences look like.
“We need to be careful that the young people in our stories are not passive recipients but active agents in the experiences of mental health,” Kendall-Taylor says, “that we don't fall into this ‘they need to be saved by us’ dynamic, which is a frequent trap that we fall into.”
Kent Pekel has spent a lot of time thinking about how stress on youth mental health gets in the way of students succeeding in class. As the superintendent in Rochester, Minnesota, he supported an overhaul of the district’s transportation system so that high school students could get more sleep with a school day start time of 8:50 a.m.
Before that change, the district tried its hand at convincing high schoolers to go to bed earlier by touting “the benefits of sleep.” The campaign didn’t land.
“The benefits of sleep were not resonating with high school kids,” Pekel says, “but recently as part of our mental health strategy, we’ve started to talk about wellness and being healthy.”
Pekel says he feels like he’s living through a second big paradigm shift in education. The first was the movement to implement early childhood education systemwide, rather than viewing it as a niche practice.
It was the framing around the importance of early childhood education, similar to what Kendall-Taylor describes for youth mental health, that helped it become more widely adopted, Pekel says. With mental health, he adds, the gap between what students need and what the education system can provide is even wider than what families faced at the onset of the early childhood education movement.
While it’s positive that students, parents and educators today are more aware of the importance of mental health, Pekel is also seeing more families that are willing to keep children home if they’re experiencing symptoms of anxiety. Like others around the country, he says his district is managing a chronic absenteeism problem. Educators like him need help differentiating between when students are experiencing true mental health problems versus when they are simply going through the typical challenges that come with being a teen.
“Not being in school has catastrophic implications for your ability to learn, and we are seeing parents using terminology that implies it’s really rooted in a mental health challenge,” Pekel says, “and sometimes our school social workers, school counselors, school psychologists say, ‘No, this is just a kid who needs a lot of support to go to class.’”
© mentalmind / Shutterstock
Of the nearly 10,000 students enrolled at Brookdale Community College in central New Jersey, about 17 percent are still in high school.
Some of them travel to the campus during the school day to take courses in introductory English, history, psychology and sociology. Others stay right at their own secondary schools and learn from high school teachers who deliver college-course lessons.
They’re part of a practice, increasingly popular nationwide, that sees teenagers complete advanced classes — mostly offered through community colleges — while juggling typical high school activities like sports practices, part-time jobs and dances.
“One of the reasons why we put a lot of time and effort into the high school programs, to get students started on the college pathway in high school, is it’s going to save them a lot of money, save them a lot of time and hopefully get them to their career goals sooner,” says Sarah McElroy, dean of pathways and partnerships at Brookdale Community College.
Called dual enrollment, the phenomenon grew for the third year in a row this year. And the growth is steep — up 10 percent compared to last year, according to the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center. That’s significant in an era when college leaders are concerned about attracting and retaining students who may be skeptical about the value of a degree and also worried about the impending “enrollment cliff” resulting from fewer Americans of traditional college age coming up in the next few years.
It’s going to save them a lot of money, save them a lot of time and hopefully get them to their career goals sooner.
Nationally, about a fifth of students who take community college courses these days are still in high school, according to John Fink, a senior research associate and program lead at the Community College Research Center. In some parts of the country, the share is even higher — it’s almost 40 percent in Iowa and Indiana, for example.
Among people who started ninth grade in 2009, about a third took some type of dual enrollment course, Fink says, adding, “That’s a big penetration into the high school market.”
The trend is catching on with policymakers and educators as they look for ways to spur college-going while also ameliorating high tuition prices.
“People are concerned about the costs of higher education: state legislators and governors, families and students,” says Josh Wyner, founder and executive director of the College Excellence Program at the Aspen Institute. “The idea of getting college credit while you’re in high school is appealing as a way of holding the cost of college down.”
Brookdale Community College is in a state that has named dual enrollment as a priority. By 2028, New Jersey aims to double the number of high school students enrolled in at least one dual enrollment course, ensure all high schools provide dual enrollment options, and close access gaps to these programs for different groups of students.
That push is evident at Brookdale. From 2018 to 2023, the college recorded a 39 percent increase in Monmouth County high school students enrolling in its college-level courses. The institution hopes to increase enrollment among high school students by 50 percent more by 2028.
“We are trying to reach every high schooler in some way,” McElroy says.
Yet Brookdale, other community colleges, and their K-12 school partners face a few challenges in order for dual enrollment to “live up to its potential as a lever of access and equity to college and careers,” Fink says.
Dual enrollment takes many forms and goes by many names. Some programs are run through well-organized early-college high schools that help students earn a full associate degree by the time they graduate. Others are more free-form, allowing students to take one or two courses as they please — a style some observers have critiqued as “random acts of dual enrollment.” Brookdale offers several different models through its high school partnerships.
Across these varied formats, dual enrollment seems to have become popular because it’s beneficial for all parties involved, according to education experts.
It’s good for students, Fink says, citing two decades of research that shows it leads to better high school and college completion rates. It’s good for community colleges, which advance their missions to serve their surrounding area — and also possibly create “a larger pool of students coming back to you” for additional classes after high school, too, he adds.
In fact, dual enrollment is “the most consistent source of enrollment growth for community colleges over the past decade,” says Nick Mathern, director of K-12 partnerships for Achieving the Dream, a nonprofit that supports a network of community colleges. “Depending on how you break down the age cohort, there is a way in which you see it’s the only source of enrollment growth for community colleges over the last decade.”
Especially in states that provide extra public funds to support dual enrollment, it’s good for school districts and public schools, proponents argue, since they can use those programs as a selling point for attracting families and students who might otherwise look to private schools, or public schools elsewhere.
These dual-enrollment programs are not replacing Advanced Placement courses, which have been a mainstay at high schools for decades and remain popular, Wyner says. Among the three-quarters of high schools that offer advanced coursework, about 78 percent offer dual enrollment compared to 76 percent that offer AP classes. But one advantage dual enrollment may have over the AP program is that it offers a much wider catalog of options, including some career and technical courses, which may appeal to a broader set of students.
“For a lot of students who are not eager to take more purely academic courses — or about test-taking and writing papers — this is an enormous opportunity to get excited about higher education through fields of study not offered in high schools,” Wyner says.
Some of the high schools that feed into Brookdale offer dual enrollment, AP courses and the advanced International Baccalaureate curriculum all at once, McElroy says: “We are finding students are taking a menu of options.”
One bonus she sees regarding the dual enrollment courses: Students know they’ll earn college credit for taking them, whereas they’ll only get college credit for AP classes if they score high enough on standardized exams.
“It transfers so widely. Four-year colleges are taking those credits,” McElroy says. “That’s helped to elevate dual enrollment across the state.”
Yet data on dual enrollment reveals that not all student groups participate at the same rate.
Racial minorities, men and students who would be the first in their families to go to college are underrepresented in these programs. In the county that feeds into Brookdale Community College, for example, “our Black and Hispanic students are not finishing at the same rate white students are,” McElroy says.
Comparing the percent of high school dual enrollment students by race and ethnicity statewide (orange) and at Brookdale (blue.) Data courtesy of Brookdale Community College.There are a few factors that contribute to this inequality, Fink says. For instance, some schools use standardized test scores to determine which students are eligible to participate, creating barriers since some groups of students consistently score lower than others. Many dual enrollment courses are taught by high school teachers who have the credentials needed to instruct at the community college level — typically a master’s degree in a relevant discipline — and at some high schools, there is a shortage of qualified teachers. And while some states have arrangements that make dual enrollment courses free for students, in other regions, families have to pay.
“If you have to pay extra to take college courses in high school, you’re going to get wealthier, whiter families taking advantage,” Fink says.
Then there is an older mindset to contend with, one that views dual enrollment primarily as an option for academically advanced students who are looking for enrichment.
It is true that some students choose dual enrollment through Brookdale to improve their chances of being accepted into a selective four-year university, McElroy says.
“We know from the research that dual enrollment courses are more rigorous than the standard- issue high school course,” Wyner says. “And so for a lot of parents and students who are eager to be challenged, they see dual enrollment as an opportunity to get exposure to college-level work and get challenged in their coursework.”
But some educators and researchers hope dual enrollment can serve as an opportunity to broaden access to higher education for “students on the margins of going to college,” Fink says, by boosting their confidence, by introducing them to topics they won’t learn about in high school that might inspire them to consider going to college, and by creating momentum for possible postsecondary studies.
“I don’t begrudge middle-class students and college-bound students the opportunity to take classes in high school,” Mathern says. “But if we are not intentional about how we deploy these programs, we are not actually changing how many students in any given community earn a college credential.”
To that end, Brookdale offers college readiness courses to its high school students who participate in dual enrollment programs, designed to teach them skills they need to succeed in advanced classes.
It’s unethical to really not provide the supports and advising. ... Unless you’re doing all of those things, it can be harmful and have the opposite of the intended effect.
“It shows students they can do it,” McElroy says. “College could be for them.”
For more high school students to succeed in dual enrollment, experts stress that schools and colleges have to specifically look out for them and guide them through the process.
“We think colleges should be establishing a shared vision with their local school districts about what they want to achieve for dual enrollment,” Mathern says. “As we open the door wider, we can’t just give more students access to college classes and call it good.”
After all, if a student tries a dual enrollment class and doesn’t succeed in it, the experience can leave them worse off than if they hadn’t attempted it all, either by wasting their tuition dollars, leaving them with a low grade that will follow them on a transcript or by discouraging them from pursuing more higher education.
“It’s unethical to really not provide the supports and advising,” Fink says. “Unless you’re doing all of those things, it can be harmful and have the opposite of the intended effect.”
To that end, Brookdale has a dedicated team of support staff for its dual enrollment programs, McElroy says, explaining, “We want to serve the students as much as possible.”
Despite the flaws that remain in many dual enrollment programs, Fink is optimistic that, with fine-tuning, they can serve as a promising pathway to better college and career-training options for more young people.
“There are a lot of reasons we would want to do things differently in the college-to-career transition. It’s largely producing poor and inequitable outcomes,” he says. “What do we do with senior year of high school? Students are checked out. By bringing more career and postsecondary training into high school, you’re blurring the line, and that’s a positive thing for students.”
© Photo courtesy of Brookdale Community College.
BuddyBooks, funded through a National Science Foundation grant, helps struggling readers, such as students with dyslexia, ADHD or other reading disabilities, improve their reading skills. It works by students and a computer take turns reading passages from a book together. Since the student is reading every other sentence, it’s a lower cognitive load. That means students can read at their interest level, not their reading skill level, that they might think are “kiddie” books.
For students with dyslexia or other reading disabilities, BuddyBooks comes with over 1 million fiction and non-fiction books.
Using Natural Language Processing, the computer verifies the student has read each sentence correctly. BuddyBooks uses this assessment information to provide feedback to the student and to provide to teachers an oral reading assessment, so the teacher can quickly target their reading instruction based on the student’s individual needs. Teachers are seeing a 24% improvement in fluency when students use BuddyBooks.
For these reasons and more, BuddyBooks from ObjectiveEd is a Cool Tool Awards Winner for “Best Special Needs / Assistive Technology Solution” as part of The EdTech Awards 2024 from EdTech Digest. Learn more.
The post BuddyBooks from ObjectiveEd appeared first on EdTech Digest.
Today and in the future, a growing array of Artificial Intelligence (AI) models and capabilities will be incorporated into the products that specifically serve educational settings. The U.S. Department of Education is committed to encouraging innovative advances in edtech to improve teaching and learning across the nation’s education systems and to supporting developers as they create products and services using AI for the educational market.
Building on the Department’s prior report, Artificial Intelligence and the Future of Teaching and Learning: Insights and Recommendations (2023 AI Report), this new guide seeks to inform product leads and their teams of innovators, designers, developers, customer-facing staff, and legal teams as they work toward safety, security, and trust while creating AI products and services for use in education. This landscape is broader than those building large language models (LLMs) or deploying chatbots; it includes all the ways existing and emerging AI capabilities can be used to further shared educational goals.
“Our insights here are intended to support people who are managing teams in the design and development of products that leverage AI to improve teaching and learning,” according to the guide’s authors. “We have attempted to address topics that will be relevant across the continuum of edtech developers, which includes established firms and newcomers, as well as developers across research, nonprofit, and for-profit organizations. We address not only developers of products for formal education settings— including elementary and secondary schools, colleges, and universities—but also for educational uses at home, community, and other informal settings.”
Among the many developers, industry associations, and nonprofit organizations that attended listening sessions and contributed their ideas for translating the Department’s recommendations for Artificial Intelligence in education into practical guidelines:
● Kristen DiCerbo, Khan Academy
● Teddy Hartman, GoGuardian
● Neil Heffernan, Worcester Polytechnic Institute
● Karl Rectanus, EDSAFE AI Alliance
● Steve Ritter, Carnegie Learning
● Sharad Sundararajan, Merlyn Mind
● Alyssa Van Camp, TeachFx
● Julia Winter, Alchemie Solutions, Inc.
The post US Dept of ED Releases ‘Designing for Edu with AI’ Developer Guide appeared first on EdTech Digest.
As educators, we understand that true learning happens when barriers are removed and diverse voices are amplified. Recently, we took the stage at the American Educational Research Association (AERA) conference to share our experiences designing accessible conferences and events. This wasn't a one-way lecture; it was a collaborative exploration, inviting the audience to contribute their insights and perspectives. Our goal? To inspire a shift in how we approach conference planning, moving beyond mere compliance to foster environments where every attendee can fully engage, learn and thrive.
Conferences serve as focal points for exchanging ideas, networking and professional growth. However, amidst the hustle and bustle of logistical planning and content curation, it is important not to overlook the crucial aspect of accessibility. Accessible conferences ensure that all attendees, regardless of physical, sensory or cognitive disabilities, can participate fully and engage with the content and networking opportunities. This inclusivity fosters a richer exchange of ideas and knowledge, contributing to the overall success of the conference.
Creating accessible conferences goes beyond simply meeting standards; it reflects a deep commitment to fostering equity and inclusivity in every aspect of the event.
The journey toward inclusivity begins with a proactive mindset, one that acknowledges and anticipates the diverse needs of attendees. Institutions and companies must embed accessibility considerations into every stage of the conference planning process. This involves engaging with disabled individuals directly, seeking their insights and perspectives to inform decision-making.
As a product accessibility lead at Anthology and someone with a personal stake in accessibility, Lomellini has been deeply involved in the planning of Anthology Together 24, alongside other disabled colleagues. Our firsthand experiences and insights are critical in shaping the event. By sharing our feedback, we help the organizers identify potential barriers that might not be obvious to someone without similar experiences. This collaborative approach is essential for implementing effective solutions and enhancing the overall accessibility of the conference.
Forming an accessibility committee stands as a cornerstone of this endeavor. This committee comprises individuals with disabilities, advocates and experts in accessibility and serves as a dedicated entity tasked with ensuring that accessibility remains a focal point throughout the planning process. Their role extends beyond mere oversight; they actively contribute insights, review plans and propose innovative solutions to address accessibility challenges comprehensively.
Physical accessibility encompasses a spectrum of considerations, ranging from Braille signage, wheelchair access to restroom facilities, ensuring ample spaces for wheelchairs in sessions, providing accessible routes and elevators, and checking the functionality of automatic door openers. Additionally, designated quiet spaces offer respite for individuals who may require a break from the sensory stimuli of the conference environment. For Anthology Together 24, Anthology has people walk through the conference spaces to identify areas for improvement. During the conference, requiring speakers to use microphones and keeping pathways clear of barriers are just a few measures that can significantly enhance inclusivity within physical spaces. Incorporating features such as picture-in-picture sign language interpretation during main-stage presentations exemplifies a commitment to inclusivity on the physical front.
In the digital dimension, accessibility extends to the design of conference materials and platforms. Mobile accessibility, for instance, supports individuals in navigating conference resources seamlessly using their smartphones or tablets. At Anthology, we have worked closely with our mobile vendor to improve the accessibility of the platform. Additionally, providing options for sign language interpretation, both in person and via virtual platforms, enhances the accessibility of presentations and discussions for individuals who are Deaf or hard of hearing.
Beyond infrastructure and technology, fostering a culture of inclusivity involves providing support mechanisms. Having knowledgeable staff or volunteers available to answer questions and offer assistance ensures that attendees can navigate the conference with ease. Establishing avenues for individuals to request specific accommodations, such as sign language interpretation or assistance navigating the venue, demonstrates a commitment to meeting diverse needs effectively. Anthology provides an online frequently asked questions page to help answer accessibility questions and empower participants to make informed decisions. We also encourage people to note any accessibility needs they would like us to consider on the registration form. However, we still anticipate diversity and plan for accessibility proactively.
Creating accessible conferences goes beyond simply meeting standards; it reflects a deep commitment to fostering equity and inclusivity in every aspect of the event. By proactively involving disabled individuals throughout the planning process, institutions and companies can create environments where all participants can engage, learn and contribute fully. At Anthology, we continue to strive to build more inclusive spaces; prioritizing accessibility in conference design serves as a testament to our collective commitment to diversity and equality in all facets of society.
© Image Credit: Lomb / Shutterstock
Nikita Dutt, a second-year student at the University of California, Davis, didn’t come to college to work with young children.
But since September, she’s spent a couple of hours per day as a tutor through the California Volunteers College Corps, a state-funded partnership program that places college students into paid internships.
She earns $700 per month, provided she tutors elementary students for at least 20 hours per two weeks. She works on math with students in Los Angeles and San Francisco, beamed in through a host program that uses virtual-first tutoring.
Sometimes, Dutt says, it can be hard to keep the students engaged, especially when they are receiving the tutoring from a busy classroom, which often happens. But she recalls one student, a sixth grader with a learning disability. He was struggling to grasp multiplication. She worked with him, diligently, for about five weeks. One day, it just clicked. It was a big deal for the family and the student, and his teacher later told her that whatever she was doing was working.
“And I realized, like, how much difference I made in the student’s learning, and so I really want to help other students as well,” Dutt says.
Dutt is one of the college students being conscripted as high-dose tutors for struggling schools. Pandemic relief funds allowed many schools to set up these programs. But with ESSER funding nearly lapsed, schools have to find other sources to keep the programs going.
Finding a steady pool of affordable tutors has proven tough, and that’s where these college students come in: Leaders of some organizations say that college students and community members help swell the number of tutors available to K-12 classrooms and may also allow schools to more sustainably fund them.
Dutt is also the beneficiary of a new high-dose tutoring training program that hopes to boost the quality of tutors, something researchers have flagged as a challenge for schools.
Much of the pandemic relief funding made available to schools went to tutoring. The Biden Administration identified high-dose tutoring — usually defined as regular, intensive, small-group tutoring — as a plausible way to give a jolt to student learning after the pandemic.
But now, with federal funds dwindling, schools have to rely on states or other sources to keep tutoring programs going.
Funding is the biggest barrier to tutoring in schools, says Alvin Makori, a doctoral student at the University of Southern California’s Rossier School of Education. Makori co-authored a research paper about the challenges to schools offering tutor services at scale. The paper — based on surveys of teachers at charter and public schools in California — also noted concerns about tutor quality and trouble finding the space and time to work tutoring into the school day as problem areas for the schools it inspected. (The study did not look at virtual high-dose tutoring, of the kind provided by some of the organizations discussed here.)
The report also recommends that schools partner with outside organizations to provide tutoring services.
That’s where a coalition behind a new tutor training program thinks it can help.
A couple of high-dose tutoring-specific collections of “nanocourses,” bite-sized lessons under 15 minutes each meant to train tutors, were recently released on Arizona State University’s Community Educator Learning Hub platform. The collections were the result of a collaboration between Annenberg Learner, Arizona State University’s Mary Lou Fulton Teachers College and Step Up Tutoring, aimed at providing tutors to beleaguered schools. Starting in the fall, the partnership will also offer a microcredential in high-dose tutoring competency.
These tutoring resources have the opportunity to build a corps of tutors across the country, because training is a big hurdle to getting willing volunteers and college students in place and to be effective, says Korbi Adams, a senior program manager affiliated with ASU.
Step Up Tutoring has had about 170 tutors go through the program to pick up instructional skills.
During the pandemic, investment into broadband and internet in low-income areas in places like Los Angeles made it possible to connect volunteers to work one-on-one with students, says Sam Olivieri, CEO of Step Up Tutoring.
The need for high-dose tutoring is still really significant, Olivieri says. But there are questions around sustainability.
College students are a promising source of tutors, she argues. They come with relationship- building skills, she says, and tend to have an easier time connecting with younger students who often want to know what it’s like to be in college.
There’s another reason schools might be eager to embrace the model of harnessing the power of college student-tutors, Olivieri says: Step Up is an approved federal work-study provider on 16 college campuses, meaning that the students’ pay comes from a sustainable source. They also work with California’s College Corps program. From those two sources, they’ve gotten about 350 tutors, she says, making it the main pool from which they draw tutors these days.
For the schools that work with Step Up, that provides the benefits of mentorship, with their children connecting to college students, and financial stability, Olivieri says. Not all of those students are education majors. But a lot of them show potential interest in or a proclivity for exploring the education field, Olivieri says.
Dutt, the UC Davis student, is glad for the opportunity.
She’s worked with six students, all between third and sixth grade. Right now, she tutors two students who take lessons from home and two who take them from school. She is also a substitute tutor, filling in when others can’t make it in the mornings.
A computer science major, she says she previously had no interest in education as a profession. “But then when I started tutoring, I realized how much I liked it, and how rewarding it felt to help students grow academically and instill confidence in them,” she says. “And so I think it kind of found like a newfound passion in teaching and tutoring and the education field.”
© Photo By Ground Picture/ Shutterstock
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