One high-leverage strategy rooted in a strong research base--the revitalized tutoring center--provides a wealth of opportunity to students who may be otherwise underserved. This embedded, open-all-day tutoring center supports collaborative teacher teams by using peer tutors and community volunteers. By centralizing resources and providing supports…

This report describes and evaluates an adult and family literacy education program at the Tom Green County Library (Texas). The project's objectives were to: provide a full-time library staff member to establish, coordinate, and promote an information, referral, and follow-up support system for literacy students; offer two in-service sessions in…

Describes the Charlottesville (Virginia) Volunteer Tutorial, a one-on-one tutorial program that promotes the literacy development of young children and involves a wide range of community volunteers. Suggests that the program offers one model of an affordable, alternative form of early intervention. (SR)

This report describes and evaluates an adult literacy education program, Project LEAD (Literacy Education and Development), at the Adrian Public Library (Michigan). The project's objectives were to: recruit functionally illiterate adults and provide reading instruction to improve literacy skills; recruit and train 65 additional volunteer tutors…

Analyzes the first three cohorts of a one-to-one community volunteer tutorial program, an integral part of the Charlottesville (Virginia) City Schools' plan to ensure that all first- and second-grade children learn to read. Demonstrates that two sessions of one-on-one tutoring per week by a trained, supported, and supervised community volunteer…

Reviews the current state of knowledge about various (adult-volunteer) tutoring programs' effects on student achievement. Except for the Howard Street Tutoring Program and the School Volunteer Development Project (two very small programs), the programs reviewed present no unbiased evidence of effectiveness. Comparison groups are needed to…

Offers a personal reflection based upon the author's experiences as Special Education Coordinator in a Catholic secondary school, where she was responsible for overseeing a reading program which used parent volunteers as tutors for students with literacy difficulties. Discusses the perceived benefits for those involved in the program. (SG)

A study was conducted to ascertain the relationship between volunteer reading tutors and the reading scores of the tutored students in the primary grades. Two groups of children were studied (N=33), and their progress in reading was observed over a period of six months. One group of children from an urban public school worked with a volunteer…

Research has shown that well-designed tutoring programs that use volunteers and other nonprofessionals as tutors can be effective in improving children's reading skills. Students with below-average reading skills who are tutored by volunteers show significant gains in reading skills when compared with similar students who do not receive tutoring…

The effectiveness of using volunteer reading tutors to work with students with reading difficulties was examined. Changes in academic engaged time, active responding time, achievement, and student attitude were assessed, along with information from tutor evaluations. Nine intervention and 8 control students (grades 3-5) with mild handicaps…

Describes "Start Making a Reader Today" (SMART), a volunteer tutoring program that helps K-2 students at risk of reading difficulties. Finds that the program improved students' word reading, reading fluency, and word comprehension, though level of performance at end of second grade was still much lower than that of average-achieving…

The America Reads challenge makes a national commitment to the goal that every child will read independently and well by the end of the third grade. The primary means of achieving this goal is to place one million volunteers in schools to tutor children in reading. However, little is known about the effectiveness of using volunteer tutors in the…

This hearing provides information on major issues that parents and educators face in establishing a parent teacher relationship conducive to improving American education and discusses ways some communities are successfully dealing with those issues. Prepared statements testify to the effectiveness of established parent and community volunteer…

This paper describes a program in which community members (retired citizens, parents, and others) provided tutorial services over a 12-week period to five learning disabled primary grade students in a resource room program. Comparison of pretest and posttest results showed a greater than 20 percent increase in reading scores. Weekly spelling test…

This document comprises the first volume of a three-volume study, mandated by the Augustus F. Hawkins-Robert T. Stafford Elementary and Secondary School Improvement Amendments of 1988, on domestic and foreign tutoring programs for disadvantaged elementary and secondary students that involve college students. This volume summarizes the results of…