Using Online Tutoring to Address COVID-19 Learning Loss and Create Jobs
Summary
The Biden-Harris Administration should create a plan for a public, online platform to connect teachers with college students and recent graduates to serve as tutors for K-12 students. One-on-one tutoring is a proven intervention that improves children’s educational competencies and increases students’ self-confidence. Along with supporting students, this platform could provide needed employment for young adults and enable teachers and students together to produce improved educational outcomes. The COVID-19 pandemic has led to the closure of more than 124,000 schools with the majority of students now learning online. Meanwhile, millions of college students have lost part-time work or are graduating into a historically difficult job market that does not have positions for them to fill. Just as the New Deal created work programs that both created employment and improved our national landscape, our country requires creative solutions that can meet the urgent needs of our time, can be quickly scaled up using modern technology and can adjust to the changing needs dictated by the cycles of the coronavirus.
FAS is invested in seeing more students gain science and technology skills and enter STEM careers, both for students and for our country’s competitive advantage.
By investing in the mechanisms that connect learning ecosystems, policymakers can build “neighborhoods” of learning that prepare students for citizenship, work, and life.
Early-career and out-of-state teachers tend to be most heavily concentrated in Alaska’s rural schools, where they face a steep curve in adjusting to a new way of life while learning the ropes of teaching.
The next administration should establish a national, federally-funded initiative to develop a robust and diverse pipeline of STEM talent.