For several years, a historic influx of federal pandemic relief funds helped public school districts across the United States expand what educators call “high-impact” or “high-dosage” tutoring programs, which proved instrumental in improving student learning and recovering from pandemic-related academic setbacks. Now that the primary source of that federal funding has officially expired, education leaders across the country are scrambling to figure out how to keep those successful academic programs afloat without sacrificing quality.
Between March 2020 and March 2021, the U.S. Congress allocated nearly $190.5 billion to public education through the Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER) fund. It marked the largest one-time federal investment in K-12 education in American history, giving districts the financial breathing room to launch aggressive interventions. Although that funding ended in phases between 2022 and 2024—with some districts receiving federal extensions to help manage their remaining balances—the financial cliff has arrived, forcing difficult decisions in school administrative offices nationwide.
In response to the drying up of federal dollars, some school districts have been forced to pause or significantly scale back their tutoring initiatives. Others, however, are working aggressively to save these vital programs by weaving them directly into their core academic systems and operational budgets. A 2026 analysis of 35 school districts conducted by the National Student Support Accelerator (NSSA) revealed a mixed landscape: eight districts had significantly reduced their tutoring programs, and another eight had experienced a temporary pause or disruption following the expiration of ESSER funds. Yet, strikingly, 19 districts—representing more than half of the sample studied—managed to successfully preserve or even expand their tutoring offerings.
Extensive educational research shows that high-impact tutoring, frequently referred to as high-dosage tutoring, has served as the single most powerful intervention to make up for pandemic learning loss. Typically, these programs occur at least three times a week, providing highly targeted academic instruction that coordinates closely with regular classroom work. According to the NSSA, programs featuring frequent sessions over a span of at least 10 weeks, delivered either individually or in small groups with data-driven instruction, can generate anywhere from three to 15 months of additional learning for participating students.
Despite these impressive academic gains, the financial reality remains daunting. Research from the Annenberg Institute at Brown University estimates that high-impact tutoring costs between $1,200 and $2,500 per student annually. Without the cushion of ESSER funds, meeting this price tag has become an immense hurdle for districts trying to balance tight budgets.
For schools that have heavily invested in these initiatives and are desperately trying to retain their benefits, the ultimate challenge lies in making tutoring a permanent, standard fixture of the educational model. Devon Wible, vice president of teaching and learning at Catapult Learning, a provider of school tutoring programs, notes that districts across multiple states are increasingly viewing tutoring not as an optional add-on, but as a foundational layer of academic support.
“A few years ago, when ESSER funds were here, the conversation was, ‘Let’s see if it works,’” Wible says. “Now it’s, ‘How do we sustain this?’”
Building Tutoring Into Existing Systems
One of the primary strategies districts are utilizing to make tutoring last is embedding it directly into the regular school day and aligning it with existing academic-support systems. While this structural shift does not completely eliminate the financial cost of running a tutoring program, it is substantially less expensive than building and maintaining a separate, standalone extracurricular program that requires separate staffing and facility coordination.
Wible explains that some districts have creatively added dedicated intervention periods or “WIN” (What I Need) blocks into their daily master schedules. This adjustment provides students with necessary extra support during school hours without pulling them away from crucial core classroom instruction. Furthermore, this integrated approach encourages much tighter, daily collaboration among regular classroom teachers, specialized tutors, and intervention staff, all of whom can share valuable student data and work collectively toward common academic goals.
Under this model, tutoring is carefully designed to complement what is happening in the classroom. If a student is struggling with grade-level reading, Wible explains, they might receive targeted coaching on foundational phonics and decoding skills while continuing to engage with complex grade-level texts during regular class time. Schools rely on ongoing student data to identify precise learning needs, continuously adjust instruction, and determine the exact moment a student is ready to successfully exit the program.
“Ultimately, our shared goal is that students experience classroom instruction, intervention and tutoring as one coherent learning experience,” Wible says.
Wible has witnessed the tangible impact of this integrated approach firsthand. An analysis conducted by Catapult Learning involving roughly 700 students spanning kindergarten through third grade across 12 Massachusetts school districts found that children made substantial literacy gains after receiving high-impact tutoring, with some achieving up to five additional months of reading progress.
In one particular Massachusetts district, the results were especially striking. After just 12 weeks of targeted tutoring, the share of kindergarten and first-grade students performing at or comfortably above grade level jumped dramatically from 11% to 55%, according to Wible.
Protecting What Works
David Blazar, an associate professor of education policy at the University of Maryland, suggests that the deeper concern moving forward may not just be whether tutoring survives, but what happens to program quality when cash-strapped schools cannot find alternative funding sources and resort to deep spending cuts.
Blazar recently co-authored a University of Maryland study examining tutoring programs across all 24 of Maryland’s school districts, analyzing how local educational agencies are designing and scaling their interventions. The analysis revealed that 18 districts offered tutoring featuring several key elements associated with stronger implementation, such as small-group instruction, frequent weekly sessions, and delivery during normal school hours.
Although the research focuses specifically on Maryland, it provides valuable insight into the broader existential questions facing districts nationwide as they attempt to sustain tutoring in a post-relief-fund era. Blazar warns that as financial pressures mount, districts are likely to consider diluting program quality by increasing group sizes, reducing session frequencies, or turning to cheaper, lower-cost providers rather than eliminating tutoring programs altogether.
“The more likely change is quieter and, in some ways, more consequential: erosion of the design features that make tutoring work,” Blazar says. “When you have to find savings, dosage — and other components of quality, including how many students work with the same tutor simultaneously — are very likely to change.”
When analyzing implementation plans under the landmark Blueprint for Maryland’s Future initiative spanning 2024 to 2027, Blazar found that Maryland districts actively planned to restructure their school schedules to keep tutoring alive. Because tutoring serves as a core statutory mandate of the state’s sweeping education policy, he expects local districts to maintain their long-term commitment to the strategy.
“I think they will continue because it is a core part of the Blueprint, and there is growing consensus that tutoring is a critical resource for improving student outcomes, so it is money well spent,” Blazar notes.
For school systems everywhere trying to stretch limited local and state dollars, the ultimate hurdle remains figuring out how to trim administrative or operational costs without compromising the foundational features that make high-impact tutoring effective in the first place, Blazar emphasizes.
One District’s Approach
West Feliciana Parish Schools in Louisiana provides a clear example of a district successfully identifying alternative funding sources to permanently embed tutoring into the rhythm of the school day. While the district already utilized basic intervention and tutoring practices prior to 2024, it dramatically expanded and formalized its school-day high-dosage tutoring program during the 2024-25 school year by leveraging state funding available through the Louisiana Department of Education’s Accelerate: High-Dosage Tutoring initiative.
To accommodate the program, the district engineered a schoolwide master schedule featuring a dedicated 30- to 50-minute block each day when standard core instruction pauses. During this window, students are separated into targeted, skill-based groups and report either to their regular classroom teacher or a specialized interventionist for high-dosage tutoring, according to Jodi Lemoine, director of accountability at West Feliciana Parish Schools.
Students who are not actively receiving tutoring during that block remain in the classroom to work independently, utilizing educational software or reading library books. Meanwhile, older students in the fourth and fifth grades receive online tutoring delivered by external instructional providers.
This deliberate approach significantly expanded the reach of the district’s academic intervention offerings. Before the initiative launched, the local reading intervention program served approximately 96 students a week. Lemoine reports that that figure skyrocketed to more than 430 students after just one year.
“From the get-go, our philosophy was: This is gonna require good teaching, not just programs,” Lemoine says.
The district closely monitors student progress every two to three weeks, making real-time adjustments as necessary. Lemoine points to internal district assessment data showing significant academic gains between the fall and spring assessments of the 2025-26 school year. According to standardized data from the Northwest Evaluation Association’s Measures of Academic Progress, the district registered notable, measurable increases in student performance across grade levels.
The Louisiana Department of Education formally recognized the district as a Model of Excellence for its innovative approach to high-dosage tutoring. By December 2024, more than 45% of its kindergarten through fifth-grade students were receiving regular tutoring—more than double the proportion served previously. Furthermore, about 60% of participating students successfully reached the established academic benchmark on their targeted literacy skills at the very first progress-monitoring checkpoint.
“We have figured out a way to use the resources we have smarter,” Lemoine says. “Our high-dose tutoring program is truly an example of that: Work smarter, not harder.”
Currently, the district relies on a carefully managed combination of state and local funding streams to keep the program operational, but district leadership remains deeply committed to sustaining it over the long term. Superintendent Hollis Milton argues that West Feliciana Parish’s ongoing success demonstrates conclusively that effective academic interventions do not have to vanish simply because a specific federal funding stream has dried up.
“If something’s working, you find the will, and then you’re gonna find the way,” Milton says.