The Covid pandemic resulted in considerable disruption to the education of pupils around the world, with many parents resorting to online tutoring in a bid to ensure their children didn’t fall behind. Research from the University of California San Diego highlights the effectiveness of such tutoring.

While there have long been suspicions around the effectiveness of such schemes, concerns have existed about both the high costs associated with them and the limited availability of tutors.

“Our program explores the possibilities of a low-cost model with volunteer tutors which has the potential to reach more students in need,” the researchers explain.

Online support

The pilot project saw K-12 students paired up with volunteer tutors from various leading research universities.  The results suggest a scaleable approach to mentoring.

“The pandemic has been a seismic and on-going disruption to K-12 schooling,” the researchers say. “We find the tutoring offered during our study helped participants close about a quarter to a third of the learning loss during COVID.”

The project reveals that students who were exposed to more online tutoring got consistently better results, with the team believing the findings are sufficiently robust to explore how the project could be scaled up.

The student tutors worked with underserved students twice a week in 30-minute sessions.  The sessions were completed during the school day and ran for 12 weeks.  The tutors worked on building a personal relationship with the students and strived to supplement their learning in reading and maths.  In total, around 230 tutors participated in the pilot from 47 participating colleges, and they mentored 264 students.

The authors explain that the recent shocks to the education system, online learning has become a central element of the education system, but it has thus far achieved mixed results.  As a result, there is a clear desire to better understand how online learning can meet the enormous demand more effectively.

“Our study also serves as proof of concept that low-cost online support with volunteer tutors can be integrated into the regular school day during both remote and in-person learning,” the researchers conclude. “We think there’s reason to be optimistic about the prospect of online tutoring, given the positive results we achieved with a significantly lower-cost program that was delivered within the challenging context of the COVID-19 pandemic.”