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Companies Want Changes in NCLB Tutoring Policies

Disappointing numbers fuel call for steps aimed at boosting participation.

Students could get better access to federally funded tutoring programs if lawmakers streamlined the sign-up process, gave states and districts money to monitor and evaluate those services, and took steps to make sure districts actually spent money for tutoring on tutoring.

Those are some of the preliminary policy arguments that commercial tutoring providers are putting forward as Congress gears up to reauthorize the No Child Left Behind Act, including its provision requiring underperforming public schools to offer students supplemental educational services, typically tutoring.

That SES provision has traveled a bumpy road since the inception of the sweeping, 5-year-old federal law, which holds schools accountable for their students’ academic performance. Only 23 percent of eligible students, or 585,000 out of 2.5 million, received NCLB tutoring in 2005-06, according to a recent analysis by Eduventures, a Boston-based firm that tracks the education market. And many tutoring companies have struggled to provide services in an environment that they contend is hostile to providers and laden with bureaucratic red tape. ( "Market for NCLB Tutoring Falls Short of Expectations," ...