Research substantiates the effectiveness of remote intervention in boosting student achievement systemwide
Student achievement in mathematics and reading has not returned to pre-pandemic levels, plunging students further behind each year. In the 2024 National Assessment of Education Progress, 40 percent of 4th graders and 30 percent of 8th graders performed below basic level in reading, the largest percentage of 8th graders scoring below basic in the assessment’s history.
While the pandemic exacerbated this learning crisis, far too many students have not learned to read or master numeracy. Schools urgently need proven solutions as they are facing ever-tighter operating budgets. Every investment needs to produce measurable impacts on learning that set up students for long-term education and economic success.
Why Virtual?
Our recent research documents the promise of virtual tutoring as a flexible and cost-effective tool for providing tailored support to students, resulting in significant improvements in learning outcomes. The effectiveness of a remote intervention is groundbreaking because the existing body of tutoring research has been limited to in-person tutoring, which has been challenging to scale at the level needed to address the extraordinary student achievement crisis.
In schools where leaders face mounting teacher vacancies or live in communities with limited local tutor pools, assembling a team of in-person tutors who can meet a schoolwide or districtwide demand for intervention is often unrealistic. Many states and districts turned to virtual tutoring during the pandemic, hoping it would overcome common implementation barriers to in-person tutoring.
Thanks to the efforts of organizations such as Accelerate, which have tested and scaled effective, affordable tutoring models, we now have solid evidence that virtual models have the potential to deliver the desired gains in achievement.
The Center for Research and Reform in Education at Johns Hopkins University reported on a 2024 randomized evaluation of Air Reading, a structured virtual tutoring program focused on foundational literacy skills. The study found that 1st-grade students assigned to tutoring four times a week for a semester gained nearly 1.6 additional months of learning. Those who attended at least 40 sessions saw even greater progress.
Other rigorous studies of virtual tutoring programs have found similar results, suggesting that while the research is still in the early stages, the impact that virtual tutoring can have is promising.
Experimental evaluations of the targeted early literacy instruction program OnYourMark and the virtual reading program BookNook resulted in modest but statistically significant effects. Across these studies, students who received a higher dosage of tutoring performed better.
These studies should be viewed in the context of dozens of other recent studies of in-person and virtual models that had little or no impact on achievement. Not all tutoring works. In fact, without the right model and strong implementation, even well-intentioned programs can waste precious time and resources.
These rigorous studies of virtual models with impact offer valuable insights regarding what makes virtual tutoring effective: The model and how it is implemented matter.
Here are key insights for adopting and managing effective virtual tutoring models.
The right people need to be doing the right things. Effective virtual tutoring uses a well-structured model designed for virtual tutoring and is delivered by a trained tutor. This means the who and the what are critical.
Proven effective models all use a curriculum with an explicit scope and sequence that can be tailored to each student’s strengths and weaknesses using aligned assessments. Tutors are extensively trained and regularly coached on using the content, materials, instructional process, feedback loops and progress monitoring tools, as well as engaging students remotely.
These road-tested packages have a constellation of strategies that work in concert, standing in sharp contrast to on-demand platforms that don’t provide systematic instruction or a homegrown tutoring model in which a vendor provides tutors to remotely review the regular classroom curriculum or help students with homework.
Dosage matters. Schools must ensure consistent and sustained student attendance and engagement. Students who receive tutoring sporadically or inconsistently see little benefit. This means that students meet with the same tutors at least three times a week for a meaningful duration, such as 10 weeks.
The importance of dosage cannot be overstated. Research studies illustrate its importance, as seen in the Air Reading study, where the impacts were an additional 1.6 months of learning for everyone and an added 2.2 months of learning for students who participated in at least 40 sessions.
Because of the importance of regular attendance, the best time to schedule tutoring is during the school day, with school staff ensuring regular participation and follow up when student attendance at sessions drops.
Virtual tutoring models can expand access to educational supports for schools and students. Highly qualified virtual tutors can be sourced beyond the local community, allowing for more flexible scheduling and the delivery of tutoring to multiple students simultaneously. This holds huge promise for the estimated 20 percent of K-12 students who attend rural schools, which often struggle to find enough invested, qualified individuals within driving distance of the school.
Virtual tutoring also presents a solution to metropolitan areas where the high cost of living makes it difficult to recruit and retain individuals to work for an hourly tutor wage. One virtual tutoring provider was able to provide more than 400 students in six rural Texas schools with certified teachers as tutors. The ability to recruit tutors in other states enabled the provider to hire a robust team that possessed the desired qualification of teacher certification.
Virtual tutoring also broadens the options for baking tutoring into the master schedule. Schools that want to schedule tutoring for all students during a single intervention block often struggle to recruit and retain enough in-person tutors to work in a school for one session almost daily. Virtual tutors, however, don’t have to travel and can seamlessly pivot to serving students in other parts of the country as part of their workday.
Infrastructure and school-level factors are critical to support program implementation. Schools need reliable technology, on-the-ground staff to track attendance and student progress, and a system to quickly address implementation challenges. The most effective tutoring is fully integrated into the school, with school staff actively engaged.
Even if school staff themselves do not provide tutoring, they should communicate with the virtual provider to stay informed about student attendance and progress. This means regular check-ins accompanied by real-time data-sharing.
School staff also must be ready for the inevitable technical challenges. Engaging the IT staff early ensures they are well-equipped for success. This school-level coordination often is the difference between virtual tutoring that closes learning gaps and virtual tutoring that has little impact on student achievement.
Practical Steps
How can school leaders assess whether virtual tutoring is a good fit for their schools and students? They can start by asking the right questions. First, ask whether the program is evidence-based and request the research study to determine its rigor and persuasiveness (e.g., is it a randomized evaluation?) and to assess whether the study’s students and context are sufficiently similar to yours (i.e., is it generalizable?).
Second, understand the model. What is the dosage? What specific skills will be addressed? How will student progress be assessed? How are tutors recruited and trained?
Third, learn more about the organization’s capacity. Can they deliver their program to the number of students and grades you wish to serve? Work through the schedule ahead of time to ensure their tutors are available during designated tutoring times.
Fourth, ask about the specific supports the school can provide to ensure success. Is a school-level coordinator needed? How much time will that require? What information or data does the school need to collect? How often will progress and attendance reports be provided? It also may be helpful to ask for a reference from another school district currently implementing the program, which can help uncover the “secret sauce” for high-quality implementation.
Finally, understand the value. Was this model worth it? Before you begin tutoring, identify what success looks like and plan for an evaluation to ensure you’re on track. Have a way to check whether the program was implemented as intended and whether student outcomes have improved as much as desired. Then track the true costs of the program, not just the direct costs from the vendor. The tutoring cost tool, developed by Accelerate (accelerate.us/cost-tool), can help the district understand the true cost of the program.
Prospective Gains
Virtual tutoring isn’t a one-size-fits-all solution, but it has the potential to scale high-quality academic support to students who need it the most. With decision making guided by evidence, thoughtful planning, strong implementation and real-time monitoring, schools can ensure that tutoring not only reaches more students but also helps them achieve meaningful learning gains.
Amanda Neitzel is the deputy director of evidence research with the Center for Research and Reform in Education at the Johns Hopkins University School of Education in Baltimore, Md. Nathan Storey is an educational research associate with CRRE. Jennifer Krajewski is director of outreach and engagement for ProvenTutoring, housed at CRRE. Matthew Steinberg is managing director of research and evaluation at Accelerate.
