The National Student Support Accelerator is excited to share the Tutoring Quality Improvement System (TQIS). This tool helps local education agencies (LEAs) and tutoring organizations assess their program’s quality by comparing their tutoring program’s characteristics and activities to a set of industry quality standards. The TQIS Advisory Group developed and regularly updates the Tutoring Quality Standards, which align with NSSA’s Framework for High-Impact Tutoring
Take this free, research-based assessment of your tutoring program to find out:
- how aligned your program is with research-based quality standards and
- how you can improve the quality of your program through tailored recommendations and resources
In addition to delivering information about how well a tutoring program aligns with the Tutoring Quality Standards, TQIS also provides LEAs and tutoring organizations with tailored recommendations and resources to support the tutoring program’s continuous improvement. TQIS allows programs to act quickly upon the feedback to improve.
The TQIS Self-Assessment can be completed in about 15-20 minutes by answering a series of questions with results, recommendations and resources available immediately. We suggest previewing this TQIS Self-Assessment Form to familiarize yourself with the questions prior to taking the assessment.
Start the Tutoring Organization Self-Assessment
A Note about Equity: A true commitment to equitable outcomes requires individuals at all levels of a tutoring program to 1) critically examine their own biases, 2) embed equity into program design, systems and structures, and 3) engage in continual reflection on program effectiveness. Throughout this assessment, you will answer questions designed to assess how well your tutoring program puts equity at the center of your practices. At the end of the self-assessment, you will receive feedback on how well your program aligns with the quality standards most closely tied to equity.
The work of striving for equity is never done, therefore we will continue to update this assessment and its recommendations to support equitable outcomes.
Intended TQIS Users
TQIS is specifically designed for a number of users:
- LEAs operating their own tutoring programs and tutoring organizations can use TQIS to identify areas for improvement once or on an ongoing basis as part of their continuous improvement process.
- LEAs and tutoring organizations developing new tutoring programs can use TQIS prior to launch to identify improvement areas iteratively as part of their design process.
- LEAs interested in partnering with tutoring organizations can request potential tutoring partners share their assessment report.
- Funders can request that grantees use TQIS to better understand program quality.
- LEAs and tutoring organizations may apply to earn the NSSA Program Design Badge to understand their program’s alignment to Tutoring Quality Standards, learn how to improve, and showcase their program design.
Why develop TQIS?
Rigorous research provides evidence that tutoring, with specific characteristics, produces large learning gains for a wide range of students, including those who have fallen behind academically. However, not all tutoring is effective, and clear standards have only recently been set for tutoring quality – making it difficult for districts to understand how aligned their in-house programs are to research-backed practices, and for districts, schools, and nonprofits who prefer to contract with a tutoring organization to identify which tutoring organizations are aligned to research-backed practices.organizations.
One way for tutoring programs to demonstrate effectiveness is through Randomized Control Trials (RCTs) which identify the effects by randomly assigning a large group of students to either receive the program or not and then following those students, measuring their outcomes and comparing the two groups. This approach is the best way of estimating the effects of a program on specific outcomes such as standardized test performance.
However, many RCTs are imperfect. Researchers intent on finding effects may use outcome measures that the program effects but are not predictive of long-term benefits for students or may simply run the analysis poorly. Independent assessments of RCT quality are needed to determine whether the estimates of program effectiveness are legitimate. Moreover, RCTs can be expensive and often take multiple years to yield results. Only the most established and well-resourced tutoring organizations have the opportunity for this type of quality validation. These barriers leave many community-based, smaller tutoring organizations — that may be just as effective — without RCT evidence.
TQIS was created in collaboration with Bellwether Education Partners, a national nonprofit focused on dramatically changing education and life outcomes for underserved children. Bellwether works to achieve its mission by helping organizations accelerate impact and improving public policy and practice for the education field. To learn more about Bellwether, please visit their website at www.bellwethereducation.org.