Published: February 25, 2004
By Catherine Gewertz
Under the federal No Child Left Behind Act, poor children in
persistently failing schools are entitled to receive free tutoring
on the government's dime. But two years after the law was signed, only a small
portion of the students eligible for those services are receiving them.
As of last week, federal officials had not yet released figures
showing how many students have been using the tutoring.
But research starting to emerge on the program estimates that in many
districts, fewer than one-quarter of eligible students—and often far less than
that—are using what the law calls "supplemental educational
services."
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See Also... |
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View the accompanying chart, "A
Look at the Supplemental-Service Market," and the accompanying
table, "Getting
Extra Help." |
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Numerous problems are suppressing enrollment. Parents often are
not fully informed of the opportunity. Schools often must wait until late fall or
winter to find out whether they have to offer tutoring.
Districts may lack the incentive to promote the programs. Providers can have
difficulty securing arrangements that make offering tutoring
practical for them.
The participation rate in supplemental services is drawing
differing interpretations. Some view the glass as half full, while others view
it as half empty.
Michael D. Casserly, the executive director of the Council of the
Great City Schools, said
that while the law is still having "growing pains," districts are
doing better at making tutoring available, and more students
are using it this year than last. The Washington-based council recently
surveyed the large urban districts that make up its membership on their
experiences implementing the No Child Left Behind law's tutoring
and school choice provisions.
"This is something that is vastly different than anyone has
ever done before, and it's taken some time to set up structures," Mr.
Casserly said.
"This is typical start-up."
But a recent study by researchers from Harvard University's Civil
Rights Project decried the low participation rate—which it found ranged from 0
percent to 16 percent last school year in 10 districts it examined—and called
for a halt to supplemental services until evidence proves tutoring
enhances student performance.
The researchers also expressed concern that because the tutoring
is financed with a portion of a district's federal Title I money for
disadvantaged students, the supplemental-services provision concentrates resources
intended for many children on only a few.
"Supplemental services shift the focus from improving poorly
performing schools to improving individual student achievement, but only for
those requesting services," the Civil Rights Project's report says.
"Combined with the loss of resources, it is unclear how this strategy will
improve low-performing schools."
Schools that receive Title I funding and fail to make targets for
"adequate yearly progress" set by their states under the No Child
Left Behind Act for two consecutive years must allow students to transfer to
other schools. Schools that fail to meet the targets for a third year must
offer supplemental services to children from low-income families. Districts
must set aside 20 percent of their Title I budgets to pay for choice and tutoring.
States compile a list of approved providers, and districts draw up
contracts with those of their choosing. Districts must notify parents that
their children are eligible, and supply information about the providers. It is
up to parents to enroll.
Federal education leaders are monitoring areas they view as posing
the most problems in implementing the law. Nina Shokraii Rees, the deputy
undersecretary in charge of the U.S. Department of Education's office of
innovation and improvement, said
high on that list are the lack of sufficient parent notification and districts'
"reluctance" to carry out the law.
Even as difficulties are being worked out, however, Ms. Rees,
whose office is overseeing implementation of the supplemental-services
provision, said the
department was "optimistic" about the way the supplemental-services
program was unfolding, given its large scale and the profound changes it asks
of the education community.
The supplemental-services requirements have prompted more than
1,000 tutoring providers to secure spots on state lists of
approved providers, according to researcher Siobhan Gorman, who analyzed the
emerging market in a paper for the American Enterprise Institute, a
Of those 1,000, 63 percent are based in the private sector,
according to the Education Department. They offer tutoring at
school buildings, in storefronts, online, in students' homes, or in community
buildings such as libraries. Nearly a third of the providers are school
systems.
The number of providers varies regionally. The American Institutes
for Research, a Washington-based research organization that is examining
aspects of the law under a contract with the Education Department, found state
lists ranging from zero providers to 223.
Mr. Casserly's survey of big-city districts found they have
contracted with an average of 24 providers, with the shortest list numbering
six, and the longest—in
What that variation can mean, according to those studying the
issue, is that parents of eligible children can be faced with too little choice
in some places, and an overwhelming amount of choice in others.
Most districts notify eligible parents of services by sending
letters explaining that their children qualify for free tutoring
and listing the approved providers. Some also try to reach parents through
advertisements, fliers, meetings, and vendor fairs.
But research and anecdotes suggest many of the mailings are never
received or understood by parents, or are misleading. Advocates For Children, a
A study by WestEd, a San Francisco-based research group analyzing
implementation of the law for the California Department of Education, showed
that only 4 percent of eligible children in
Criticized for low participation rates, many districts are
stepping up efforts to get the word out.
Analysts say the enrollment picture also is improving because
companies and districts have established more of the infrastructure to run the
programs, and are learning how to operate them more effectively. But bumpy
zones remain.
Some states have been late in posting approved-provider lists, or
in making final determinations of which schools have not made adequate yearly
progress and thus have students eligible for tutoring.
Additional time goes by as districts and schools exercise their rights to appeal
their status. By the time schools are certain they must offer tutoring,
and districts forge contracts to provide it, half an academic year might have
passed.
Negotiations between districts and providers to set up programs can
expose differences in method, terms, and goals.
The Council of the Great City Schools' survey, for instance, found
that while providers want to base fees on how many students enroll in the
program, districts want to base them on how many actually attend—which can
exacerbate a provider's uncertainty about whether it's a viable business
venture.
Providers often want to hold sessions in schools, but some
districts forbid that arrangement or insist on charging rent to use their premises.
Seppy Basili, the vice president of New York City-based Kaplan K12
Learning Services, which is approved to provide supplemental services in more
than 30 states, said
that in approaching a potential district contract, he gauges principals and
district leaders to determine whether they view it as a threat or a
partnership. The marketplace offers enough opportunity that he doesn't need to
push for contracts with districts that impose so many restrictions that he
can't operate effectively, he said.
"If a district doesn't get it, I move on," Mr. Basili said.
Researchers found that some districts saw little reason to
encourage contracts with private providers, because they wished to conserve as
much of their Title I budgets as possible. According to Mr. Basili, district
Title I directors often exhibit a "gatekeeper mentality" that makes
them the officials least receptive to his company's prospective contract.
Some private providers who wanted to offer tutoring
in Detroit, for instance, were told by district employees "not to stir up
business" so that Title I funds lasted longer, according to David N. Plank
and Christopher Dunbar Jr., Michigan State University researchers who examined
Michigan's experience implementing the No Child Left Behind law in a recent
paper for the American Enterprise Institute.
According to federal officials, districts may promote their own
programs, but must also give parents a fair choice among all eligible
providers.
"We've opened up a regulated free market here," said Thomas
M. Corwin, the Education Department's associate deputy undersecretary for
innovation and improvement. "If [districts] can compete on a fair basis
and enroll a lot of the kids, that's okay. But they can't create obstacles to
the others."
Private providers assess not only a district's willingness to
partner with them, but also other factors, such as the concentration of
children to be served in a given area, whether the company has other customers
in contiguous districts, and whether it has a network of contacts in the
district to support its work.
In some places, that calculus doesn't support a sound business
plan. In
Personnel shortages can create problems, too. In
Where a school district is itself a state-approved provider of tutoring
services, additional tensions can arise.
Jeffrey H. Cohen, the president of Sylvan Education Solutions, a
Baltimore-based company on 29 states' provider lists, said that he seeks to form productive
partnerships with districts, but that their role as providers can "drive a
competitive wedge" between his company and the districts.
One provider told Advocates For Children in
In a glossy brochure of providers mailed home, school districts
are often the one choice parents are familiar with. They can offer on-site tutoring
and transportation with more ease than can private providers. Where districts
provide tutoring services, they often enroll the lion's share of
students.
In New York City last school year, for instance, only 12 percent
of students who signed up for tutoring used outside
providers, said Betty
Arce, the director of supplemental-services implementation for the 1.1
million-student district.
Stung by criticism that it was serving its own interests at the
expense of parental choice, the district is taking steps this school year to
even the playing field by encouraging parents to choose private providers. So
far this year, Ms. Arce said,
35 percent of eligible students are using outside providers.
In
Mr. Liechty sees no reason to allow outside companies to promote
their programs at schools during the day, or hold tutoring
sessions at schools without paying rent, as they have sought to do. The
district is entitled, he said,
to use its assets to its own advantage.
"Some providers see the district as being a bully," Mr.
Liechty said.
"But I don't feel it's important to try to level the playing field. I
believe—and I'm biased, I'm a public educator—that we do it better than anybody
else.
"No Child Left Behind is a way of trying to privatize public
education," he argued. "It's important for the districts to be
players in this."
Districts are in a tough place, said
"We're trying walk a fine line here," she said.
"There is a finite number of dollars available, and if we didn't have
[supplemental educational services], the money would go to instruction and
teachers."
Districts are required to provide supplemental services to
students with disabilities and to those learning English, but some are
reporting difficulty finding private providers willing or able to do so.
The Advocates For Children survey in
Districts reported in the Council of the Great City Schools study
that providers often sought the right not to serve English-learners and special
education students.
"In my experience, private providers have a very limited
capacity to provide services for [English as a second language] and special ed
students," said
Ms. Collier of
The 433,000-student
While problems with providing supplemental services have surfaced
most clearly in urban districts—because they tend to have the greatest
concentrations of eligible children—rural areas are struggling with their own
implementation troubles. Chief among them is finding enough providers, or
finding providers willing to deliver face-to-face tutoring.
Alex Medler, a University of Colorado researcher who examined
implementation of the No Child Left Behind law in Colorado, found in a recent
paper that more than 20 providers were willing to work with Denver students,
but rural districts had an average of only four providers from which to choose.
Kathryn Pokorney knows that story firsthand as the principal of
"I didn't like having only online providers as my only
choice," said
Ms. Pokorney. "In a small, rural community, the connection of being able
to help parents with questions they have is important."
Those studying the tutoring provision of the law
are wondering how its effectiveness will ultimately be evaluated, as the law
requires. Even federal Education Department officials have acknowledged that an
evaluation could be difficult.
Some providers fear they could be held to an impossible standard,
while states and districts are still figuring out how they should judge one
provider against another and determine how successful tutoring
has been overall.
As the accountability requirements of the No Child Left Behind Act
grow steeper, so does anticipation that more schools will be required to
provide tutoring.
"All this stuff sounded very good when they were debating it
in Congress," said
Fred Tempes, a WestEd program director who oversees a network of federally
financed centers that help districts carry out the law. "But it's very
difficult to implement."
Vol. 23, Issue 24, Pages 1,16-17
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"More
Students Transfer Schools, but Total Is Small, Study Reports,"
Jan. 21, 2004.
"Projects
Strive to Aid Parents on Federal Law," Nov. 5, 2003.
"Spread
the Word on Tutoring, Bush Urges," Sept. 19, 2003.
"Studies
Show Peer Tutoring Yields Benefits for Students," July 9, 2003.
"States
Suffer Halting Start on Tutoring," Sept. 25, 2002.
"Pa.
Tutoring Effort Could Foreshadow ESEA Results," May 15, 2002.
"Tutoring
Services See Opportunity in New Law," Jan. 23, 2002.
"Federal
Aid for Tutoring Gathers Momentum," April 25, 2001.
Read the Department of Education's non-regulatory guidance for
implenting supplemental educational services, August 2003. Also
available: Supplemental
Education Services: Quick Reference for Parents (including a Spanish
version). (Requires Adobe's Acrobat
Reader.)
View an Education
Department Webcast on How
to Apply to Become an Effective Supplemental Services Provider.
Sylvan Education Services, a
private tutoring company, provides its own resource
center on supplemental education services. Includes frequently-asked-questions
and a fact
sheet (June 13, 2002). (Requires Adobe's Acrobat
Reader.)
© 2005 Editorial
Projects in Education