Abstract:
Improving the educational outcomes of economically disadvantaged children is a policy priority in the United States, and yet relatively little progress has been made in recent decades. Education reforms that aim to help economically disadvantaged students often focus on improving the quality with which grade level material is taught, or the incentives that students have to learn it. Yet such efforts may not adequately account for important differences within a classroom of students—differences in knowledge, in learning styles, or the rate at which students learn. As a result, in spite of these efforts, students who fall behind grade-level material tend to stay behind. When these students miss developing crucial foundational skills, they can have major difficulties in subsequent learning tasks, which worsens the gap between them and their grade-level peers as they move from one grade to the next. This persistent mismatch between the learning needs of students and what classroom instruction delivers can seriously undermine students’ chances of success in the workforce and beyond. We propose scaling up a daily, individualized tutorial program that would allow students who have fallen behind grade level in math to reengage with regular classroom instruction, likely increasing their chances of graduating high school and achieving the many long-term economic benefits that go along with academic success.
Authors:
Roseanna Ander, University of Chicago
Jonathan Guryan, Northwestern University and the National Bureau of Economic Research
Jens Ludwig, University of Chicago and the National Bureau of Economic Research
Via:
Hamilton Project Updates:
www.hamiltonproject.org
Header image: Kleur: Hamilton Project