For several years, a massive infusion of federal pandemic relief funds helped school districts across the United States expand what educators call "high-impact" or "high-dosage" tutoring programs. These targeted interventions proved remarkably effective at helping students recover from widespread learning disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. Now that the primary source of federal funding has officially expired, education leaders across the country are scrambling to find creative ways to keep those vital programs afloat.<\/p>\n
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. This represented the largest one-time federal investment in K-12 education in American history. Designed to help schools navigate the operational and academic fallout of the pandemic, the funding ended in phases between 2022 and 2024, although select districts managed to secure temporary extensions to wind down their projects or transition their budgets. <\/p>\n
In response to the fiscal cliff, school districts have taken varied paths. Some have been forced to pause or significantly scale back their tutoring operations, while others are working aggressively to save them by weaving them directly into their core academic systems and sustainable local budgets. A 2026 analysis of 35 school districts conducted by the National Student Support Accelerator (NSSA) revealed that eight districts had significantly reduced their tutoring programs, and another eight had experienced a temporary pause or disruption following the expiration of ESSER. However, 19 districts\u2014representing more than half of those studied\u2014successfully preserved or even expanded their tutoring initiatives despite the loss of federal dollars.<\/p>\n
Decades of educational research, amplified by recent pandemic-era findings, show that high-impact tutoring has been the single most powerful intervention for making up for lost instructional time. Typically defined as tutoring that occurs at least three times a week, these programs provide targeted instruction delivered in close coordination with regular classroom work. According to the NSSA, programs featuring frequent sessions over a duration of at least 10 weeks\u2014delivered either individually or in small groups using data-driven instruction\u2014can generate an estimated three to 15 months of additional learning for students.<\/p>\n
Yet, sustaining this level of personalized attention comes with a heavy price tag. 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 backing of ESSER funds, meeting this financial burden has proven exceptionally difficult for many cash-strapped public school systems.<\/p>\n
For schools that heavily invested in these initiatives during the height of federal relief and are now desperate to retain their benefits, the central challenge is transforming tutoring from a temporary fix into a permanent standard fixture of the school day. Devon Wible, vice president of teaching and learning at Catapult Learning, an organization that provides tutoring programs to schools, notes that districts in several states are increasingly viewing tutoring not as an optional add-on, but as a foundational layer of academic support.<\/p>\n
"A few years ago, when ESSER funds were here, the conversation was, ‘Let\u2019s see if it works,’" Wible observes. "Now it\u2019s, ‘How do we sustain this?’"<\/p>\n
One of the primary strategies districts are employing to make tutoring last is embedding it directly into the regular school day and existing academic-support frameworks. While this structural integration does not entirely eliminate the financial cost of providing instruction, it is significantly less expensive than creating and running a separate, standalone extracurricular program after hours, which often incurs additional costs for transportation and staff stipends.<\/p>\n
Wible explains that some districts have chosen to add dedicated intervention periods or "WIN" (What I Need) blocks to their daily master schedules. This grants students necessary time for extra academic support without pulling them away from core classroom instruction. She notes that this approach also fosters tighter collaboration among classroom teachers, specialized tutors, and intervention staff, who can regularly share student data and work collaboratively toward common academic goals.<\/p>\n
Under this model, tutoring is explicitly designed to align with classroom instruction. For instance, a student struggling with grade-level reading might receive targeted coaching on foundational phonics and decoding skills during the intervention block, while continuing to engage with complex grade-level texts alongside their peers in the regular classroom. Schools utilize ongoing student assessment data to identify specific learning needs, adjust instructional strategies dynamically, and determine precisely when a student has mastered a concept and is ready to exit the program.<\/p>\n
"Ultimately, our shared goal is that students experience classroom instruction, intervention, and tutoring as one coherent learning experience," Wible says.<\/p>\n
Wible has witnessed the measurable impact of this integrated approach firsthand. A Catapult Learning analysis tracking roughly 700 students in kindergarten through third grade across 12 Massachusetts school districts found that children made substantial literacy gains after receiving high-impact tutoring, with many achieving up to five additional months of reading progress over their baseline projections.<\/p>\n
In one specific Massachusetts district, the results were particularly striking. After just 12 weeks of targeted tutoring, the share of students in kindergarten and first grade performing at or above grade level jumped dramatically from 11% to 55%, according to Wible.<\/p>\n
Despite these encouraging outcomes, educational policy experts warn that financial pressures could silently undermine the quality of tutoring programs nationwide. David Blazar, an associate professor of education policy at the University of Maryland, suggests that the deeper concern is not necessarily whether tutoring disappears entirely, but what happens to program quality when schools cannot find alternative funding sources and are forced to cut spending.<\/p>\n
Blazar recently co-authored a University of Maryland study examining tutoring programs across Maryland\u2019s 24 school districts, analyzing how local educational agencies are designing, funding, and scaling their initiatives. The analysis found that 18 districts offered tutoring featuring several key elements associated with stronger implementation, such as small-group instruction, frequent weekly sessions, and delivery during regular school hours. <\/p>\n
While the research centers specifically on Maryland, it offers broad insight into the questions facing districts everywhere as they attempt to sustain tutoring in a post-relief era. Blazar anticipates that as budgets tighten further, districts may quietly consider increasing group sizes, reducing the frequency of weekly sessions, or turning to lower-cost, less rigorous providers rather than completely eliminating tutoring from their offerings.<\/p>\n
"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\u2014and other components of quality, including how many students work with the same tutor simultaneously\u2014are very likely to change."<\/p>\n
Blazar\u2019s analysis of implementation plans under the Blueprint for Maryland\u2019s Future from 2024 to 2027 revealed that Maryland districts planned to restructure their daily schedules to keep tutoring operational. Because tutoring serves as a core statutory mandate of the state\u2019s landmark education policy, he expects Maryland districts to maintain their long-term commitment to the strategy.<\/p>\n
"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.<\/p>\n
For districts across the country trying to stretch limited local dollars, the ultimate challenge is figuring out where to trim administrative costs without weakening the core pedagogical features that make high-impact tutoring effective in the first place, Blazar explains.<\/p>\n
West Feliciana Parish Schools in Louisiana offers a clear example of a district successfully identifying alternative funding sources to permanently integrate tutoring into the school day. The district had maintained basic intervention and tutoring practices prior to 2024, but it dramatically expanded and formalized its school-day high-dosage tutoring program during the 2024-25 school year with critical assistance from state funding made available through Louisiana\u2019s Accelerate: High-Dosage Tutoring initiative.<\/p>\n
To accommodate the program, the district designed a schoolwide master schedule incorporating a daily 30- to 50-minute block during which core instruction pauses. During this time, students are divided into 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. <\/p>\n
Students who are not receiving tutoring during that specific block remain in the classroom and engage in independent work, utilizing educational software or reading library books. For older students, fourth and fifth graders received online tutoring facilitated through external providers. <\/p>\n
This structural approach significantly expanded the reach of the district\u2019s intervention program. Before the initiative was implemented, the reading intervention program served roughly 96 students a week. Lemoine notes that that number surged to more than 430 students after just a single year.<\/p>\n
"From the get-go, our philosophy was: This is gonna require good teaching, not just programs," Lemoine says.<\/p>\n
The district closely monitors student academic progress every two to three weeks, making real-time adjustments as necessary. Lemoine points to district assessment data showing consistent gains between the fall and spring testing windows of the 2025-26 school year. According to data from the Northwest Evaluation Association\u2019s Measures of Academic Progress, the district recorded notable increases in student performance across grade levels.<\/p>\n
West Feliciana was officially recognized by the Louisiana Department of Education 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\u2014more than double the proportion that had received it previously. Furthermore, about 60% of participating students reached the established benchmark on their targeted literacy skill at the very first progress-monitoring checkpoint.<\/p>\n
"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."<\/p>\n
The district currently relies on a carefully managed combination of state and local funding streams to keep the program operational, but local leadership remains firmly committed to sustaining it for the long haul. Superintendent Hollis Milton emphasizes that the district\u2019s success proves academic interventions do not simply have to disappear once a specific federal funding stream runs dry.<\/p>\n
"If something\u2019s working, you find the will, and then you\u2019re gonna find the way," Milton says.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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