The flood of resources was backed by an extensive body of evidence. Dozens of studies conducted before the pandemic showed that the positive effects of tutoring were among the largest ever seen in education policy. To help a generation of young learners return to their pre-COVID trajectory, advocates argued, there appeared to be no strategy more effective than recruiting thousands of tutors to provide regular supplemental instruction. 

But a shared exclusively with 蜜桃影视 raises doubts about whether the remarkable learning gains measured in prior studies can actually be produced by the kinds of large-scale initiatives that have been launched since 2020. Released Monday, the wide-ranging overview of over 250 high-quality studies finds that as tutoring programs grow, their impact steadily shrinks.聽

The findings, which are predominantly drawn from pre-COVID papers, dovetail with disappointing results of some local efforts that have been undertaken in the pandemic鈥檚 wake. They also reflect the well-acknowledged reality 鈥� observed throughout education research and the social sciences more generally 鈥� that the enormous benefits sometimes seen in highly controlled settings are seldom if ever carried over to larger populations. 

Study author Matthew Kraft, an economist at Brown University the spread of tutoring, said that the promise of the approach should not be eclipsed by the 鈥渉igh, and sometimes outsized, expectations鈥� attached to it.

鈥淲e have to be realistic about how hard it is to do anything well in education out of the gate, let alone make fundamental changes to the core structures of teaching and learning,” he said.

of the boost stemming from 鈥渉igh-impact鈥� tutoring, which emphasizes one-on-one or small-group instruction in large doses, have been sizable 鈥� about as much as an entire year of reading growth for elementary schoolers, and twice that seen by high school freshmen, as quantified through standardized test scores. By comparison, the advantages conferred to students in larger interventions ranged from one-third to one-half that magnitude.

University of Virginia Professor Beth Schueler, Kraft鈥檚 co-author, argued that those outcomes remained 鈥減retty impressive,鈥� if not the equal of what had been measured previously. 

鈥淓ven though the large-scale programs weren’t replicating the enormous effects that you find with small-scale trials, the size of the impact that we find for these more policy-relevant studies are still quite meaningful.鈥�

Notably, the 265 studies included in Schueler and Kraft鈥檚 analysis are all built around randomized control trials, seen as the empirical gold standard in quantitative research. They were all conducted in the countries making up the , a group of wealthy, industrialized nations whose education systems are often compared against one another. 

Across the entire sample of studies, average effects from tutoring were roughly equivalent to those found in earlier research reviews. But improvements to test scores shrank substantially when the authors looked only at programs enrolling between 400 and 999 pupils; they grew smaller still when restricted to those enrolling more than 1,000. 

Robert Balfanz, a professor at Johns Hopkins University School of Education, observed that the early hype promoting tutoring as a 鈥渟ilver bullet鈥� for COVID-related learning loss was destined to be deflated when school districts began leveraging them to reach thousands of struggling students. Still, he added, even high-enrollment efforts delivered important growth to children.

鈥淭his study just shows the reality that [tutoring] is a very effective intervention, but it’s going to take a lot of time and patience and learning to get it to work at scale,鈥� said Balfanz, who has contributed to to recruit 250,000 tutors and mentors to work in schools. 鈥淓ven then, scale is always going to diminish what you can do for a smaller group.”

An issue of scale

Emerging research on COVID-era tutoring initiatives has attested to the complexities facing state and district leadership. 

Kraft last month of Nashville鈥檚 program, which was established in 2021 and has grown to incorporate about 10 percent of the district鈥檚 total students. Over its first two years in operation, students鈥� reading performance has improved only modestly, with no corresponding gains in math. Another low-touch experiment, targeting middle schoolers in suburban Chicago, detected only a slight upturn in standardized test scores from a handful of tutoring sessions offered over Zoom.

But some advocates caution that it may be premature to measure the influence of tutoring systems that only got underway during a public health emergency. Buffeted by school closures and an uncertain budgetary picture, the initial transition to tutoring was rocky in many areas. Districts found it challenging to coordinate with families who had disengaged from schools, and an ultra-hot labor market made tutoring recruitment especially difficult.

Ashley Bencan is the chief operating officer of the , which launched as a pilot in the summer of 2021. Since then, the organization has grown to partner with 10 district and charter school partners in over 30 locations. But even buoyed by federal and state funding, Bencan said, local schools have struggled to build up tutoring systems on top of their typical organizational demands. 

Even collecting data on which students participate in tutoring 鈥� a vital step in determining whether the efforts actually work, Bencan said 鈥� can test the capacity of both school districts and state education agencies.

鈥淚f you’re juggling all the different things you have to work on to kick off the school year 鈥� reviewing data, grouping kids, filling positions 鈥� they have to meet those basic needs first, and only then think of what else they can do,鈥� she said. 鈥淭utoring isn’t designed to meet those basic needs, and we need to think about how we make it part of a school’s model.”

The logistical challenges of shoehorning tutoring into already-packed school schedules, finding sites where sessions can occur, and connecting families with tutors, can be considerable. Though Kraft and Schueler write that the design of successful tutoring programs can be effectively duplicated at a larger scale, they also find that implementation quality sometimes suffers in the course of expansion. Polls of district leaders that larger schools consistently saw lower participation rates from students, and only about one-sixth of principals in one survey reported that they had faced no barriers in providing tutoring.

Encouragingly, Kraft and Schueler鈥檚 analysis suggests that some program structures can withstand the pressures of scale. If the programs conducted in-person tutoring during school hours, featuring a student-tutor ratio of no more than 3:1, and met at least three times each week (along with other conditions), their effects were more robust with larger numbers of students. While the average impact for a program serving 100鈥�399 pupils was 42 percent smaller than one serving less than 100, those employing the high-quality practices listed above saw their effects diminished by just 18 percent.

Schueler said the diminished, though still significant, effects of scaled-up tutoring may simply suggest that policymakers have underestimated both the scale of learning loss and the hurdles to manufacturing new learning assets from scratch.  

鈥淲e are finding suggestive evidence that those implementation challenges are real, and policymakers need to think about how to get that stuff right.鈥�

In a city renowned for its colleges and universities, Boston Public Schools earned its own acclaim in recent years as an innovative, fast-improving hub of K-12 excellence. Situated in the birthplace of American public education, and combining generous funding with a thriving charter school sector, the district was held up for over a decade as a model of urban education reform. 

But as the 2021-2022 school year draws to a close, those past accolades seem as distant as the days of Horace Mann. Amid plummeting enrollment, persistent achievement gaps, and a nasty COVID hangover, Boston faces perhaps the greatest educational crisis since its scarring experience with desegregation in the 1970s. And in the weeks to come, the city may lose more than its national luster.

In March, Massachusetts Education Commissioner Jeffrey Riley of the state of the district. Both local and national experts wondered openly whether the review, which follows a , was the first step toward a complete takeover of the region鈥檚 largest school district. In the months since, of bad press has done nothing to quiet speculation.

The audit, released Monday, provided the latest sign that state authorities are strongly considering action. Despite making improvements in a few areas, the reviewers found, 鈥渢he district has failed to effectively serve its most vulnerable students, carry out basic operational functions, and address systemic barriers to providing an equitable, quality education.鈥� The situation called for 鈥渋mmediate improvement,鈥� they concluded.

The prospect of receivership (as takeovers are known locally) is hardly unprecedented in Massachusetts, which allows its education department greater latitude to reshape failing school districts than most state authorities elsewhere. But the structural problems facing Boston cast doubt on whether such an effort can be successful.

For three decades, the district has operated substantially under mayoral control, and newly elected Mayor Michelle Wu has already made clear her opposition to state intervention. Republican Gov. Charlie Baker 鈥� an education reform ally whose tenure has seen several takeovers 鈥� will soon be leaving office, likely to make way for a Democratic successor with sharply different views.

Wu told the that she met with Baker and Riley Friday and that they are still working on an agreement 鈥渢hat will set the district up for success.鈥�

鈥淎 lot of what is in the review matches with what our school communities and administrators have been calling for, in how urgently we need to focus on BPS and our young people, and in the need for strong, effective leadership,鈥� she said.

Cara Candal, a senior fellow at , said it was ambiguous whether Riley was leaning toward receivership or a somewhat less drastic approach. While significant obstacles existed, she said the recently completed review demonstrated that 鈥渒ids aren鈥檛 learning, and many are unsafe in school.”

Candal, who calling a takeover Boston鈥檚 鈥渂est hope鈥� for revival, said her takeaway was that things were 鈥渁s bad as expected in some places and worse in others. In my opinion, the report underscores that the state needs to move with some urgency to provide BPS with the structures, support, and accountability necessary to effect change 鈥� There is a window for the state to act now, and I hope it will.鈥� 

Ultimately, the audit called for 鈥渂old, student-centered decision-making and strong execution鈥� to reverse what it described as the district鈥檚 鈥渆ntrenched dysfunction.鈥� What that means in practice is difficult to predict. The Massachusetts Board of Elementary and Secondary Education is expected to deal with the report鈥檚 findings at its regular meeting on Tuesday morning.

But Ross Wilson, executive director of the Boston-based Shah Family Foundation, said Massachusetts should consider multiple options for intervention instead of duplicating the takeovers of major districts that have taken place in other states.

鈥淥ur state and city have the opportunity to do things differently,鈥� Wilson argued in an email. 鈥淲e should think creatively, collaboratively, and with urgency about the support and accountability necessary to serve the students of Boston.”

鈥楢 steady stream of negative reports鈥�

Few share Wilson鈥檚 historical perspective on the highs and lows of Boston Public Schools. A former kindergarten teacher, school principal, and central office administrator, he finished his career with the district in 2017 as deputy superintendent.

That long tenure gave him an inside look at Boston鈥檚 ascent in the late-1990s and 2000s as a district known for continuity and rising performance. The schools were overseen for over a decade by Superintendent Tom Payzant, who placed and enjoyed a strong partnership with the city鈥檚 similarly long-serving mayor, Tom Menino. By the end of his tenure, Payzant was frequently named as one of America鈥檚 best schools chiefs, and the district the prestigious Broad Prize for excellence in urban education. As measured by the National Assessment of Academic Progress, the academic growth of Boston students that of students in other major districts during this time.

The momentum carried on for several years after Payzant鈥檚 departure but eventually began to stall. A major culprit was churn: Including interim appointments, Boston has named four superintendents since 2012. Fast turnover has also extended to the bureaucracy 鈥� between 2016 and 2019, the district, and less than 12 percent stayed in the same role 鈥� and even to the mayor-appointed school committee, which over the last few years.

Wilson remembered that the strategy for governing both traditional K-12 schools and their more autonomous counterparts (the district operates over 20 鈥減ilot schools鈥� that enjoy greater flexibility in hiring, setting budgets, and choosing curriculum) had 鈥渟hifted from superintendent to superintendent,鈥� leading to 鈥渙verall confusion.鈥�

The result of Commissioner Riley鈥檚 first review was a highly critical document that pointed to 鈥渟taggering鈥� rates of student absenteeism; in all, close to one-in-three Boston students attended schools that ranked in the bottom 10 percent across the state. In response, the city joined in a 鈥渕emorandum of understanding鈥� with Riley鈥檚 state education department in March 2020, pledging to turn around achievement in underperforming schools, diversify its workforce, and revamp its oft-troubled system of school transportation. 

But the memorandum went into effect at almost the exact same time that the city鈥檚 schools first closed due to COVID-19, not to reopen for fully in-person learning for over a year. As in most of the country, test scores tumbled dramatically during the pandemic. Since students returned to classes, however, Boston has also been plagued by constant bad press, including several of against school employees; at a K-8 school that the school committee voted to close; and that has left the district nearly 20 percent smaller than it when it won the Broad Prize. 

In February, Superintendent Brenda Cassellius that she would resign in June after three tumultuous years. In a letter to the school community, the Globe reported Monday, she vowed to push forward needed changes but acknowledged that 鈥渢his work will require increasing staffing, operational support, and other resources, including a more robust collaboration with City departments, to ensure that we are prepared to meet all of our students鈥� needs.鈥�

Paul Reville, a professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Education who formerly served as the Massachusetts Secretary of Education, said that the search for a new superintendent came at a distinctly unpropitious moment. 

鈥淲e’re trying to attract a new superintendent at a time when we’re on the heels of two superintendencies that did not end well,鈥� observed Reville, who receivership. 鈥淲e’re facing the threat of a state takeover, we’ve got a steady stream of negative reports on the performance of the school system, and the governance system is shifting. So you might be a superintendent working for a new boss in two years.鈥�

Top on the list of responsibilities for the next superintendent will be dealing with a daunting set of problems laid out in the state audit. Among them:

• While one-in-five local students take part in special education, that area of services 鈥渞emains in disarray鈥� two years after the 2020 review found them to be sorely wanting. Education of English learners was also highlighted for particular criticism.
• Boston is not meeting minimal standards for the delivery of essential district services, including school transportation. Late or uncovered bus routes are 鈥渟ignificantly disrupting education for tens of thousands of students each month,鈥� the authors wrote.
• Even the grievances identified in the audit may understate the extent of the problems because of a 鈥減attern of inaccurate or misleading data reporting by the district.鈥� BPS officials inflated the number of buses arriving on time, inaccurately reported the number of school bathrooms it had renovated, and possibly displayed incorrect student enrollment and withdrawal data on its public website.

Skepticism on takeovers

But if the problems facing Boston are significant, it鈥檚 not clear that receivership is the remedy.

Takeovers are among the most contentious school improvement strategies available to states. Even when launched in cities where schools have struggled to serve students for many years, they often sideline elected boards and offend both teachers and families by abrogating local control. Some scholars contend that by alienating voters 鈥� disproportionately those of color in cities like Boston 鈥� from governance of their own institutions, takeovers do more civic harm than educational good. 

What鈥檚 more, evidence of their effectiveness is somewhat scant. A 2021 study of takeovers initiated in dozens of mid-sized school districts found that, on average, they yielded no positive outcomes on test scores; in fact, the disruption of the move led to further struggles in some communities.

Reville argued that the recent history of district takeovers suggested that most states lacked the capacity or the legal scope to pursue them effectively. 

鈥淚 think our legislation gives the state more tools and more power than is the case virtually anywhere else in the country, so if you got a chance to do it, it would be in Massachusetts,鈥� he said. 鈥淪till and all, I think the evidence from past experience suggests more modest expectations about state takeover.鈥�

Much of the Massachusetts debate will center on the existing takeovers launched over the last decade in the long-scuffling districts of Southbridge, Holyoke, and Lawrence. None of the three school systems have yet regained control over their school systems, and all still rank among the lowest-performing in the state. Still, initial test results included in the 2021 analysis found that reading test scores had improved somewhat in both Holyoke and Lawrence. Receivership in the latter city was personally overseen by none other than Riley, whose appointment as state schools commissioner was predicated partly on the results he achieved in Lawrence.

“Although nationally we don’t have great evidence that this is a key way to improve academic achievement, it does seem like Massachusetts has a stronger track record in this area than other states at using receivership toward the ends of improving achievement,” said study coauthor Beth Schueler, a professor of education and public policy at the University of Virginia.

Because of the relatively narrow time period under observation, that paper excluded the takeovers of schools in New Orleans and Newark, where student outcomes improved sizably while under state control. But in those cases, a principal tactic of improvement was the expansion of high-performing charter school networks, which came to enroll sizable portions of K-12 students across both cities. Boston is similarly home to in the country, but a statewide cap on new charter schools prevents their expansion.

“As much as I would love to say to Boston families, immediately, ‘We’re going to knock down district boundaries and make choice available to you,’ that’s not going to happen in Massachusetts,鈥� the Pioneer Institute鈥檚 Candal said. 鈥淚 think there are lessons to be learned, but we’re not going to be a Newark or a New Orleans because the other stakeholders in the state won’t allow it.”

A ticking electoral clock

The dynamics of receivership in Boston would differ from prior takeovers in at least one other aspect: Authority would be flowing away from a newly elevated leader with an unblemished record, and toward a state government that is headed for the exits.

Wu, both the first woman and first non-white person elected as Boston mayor, won the Democratic Party鈥檚 nomination in 2021 with for the district鈥檚 future. In office for just four months, she has already proposed her own 鈥淕reen New Deal鈥�: a $2 billion investment in school renovation and construction. With Superintendent Cassellius stepping down, she will soon help select BPS鈥檚 next leader, the most crucial decision facing the district in the coming months.

Wu鈥檚 outsize influence over local schools means that if receivership comes, it will be at the expense of a well-known and highly popular figure rather than the obscure members of a local school board. Wu has already demonstrated her awareness of that advantage by , alongside the head of the Boston Teachers Union, to warn against the possibility of receivership.

In a statement responding to the audit, Boston Teachers Union President Jessica Tang called the timing of the release “suspect, rushed, and ill-advised,” alleging that the state report was marred by unspecified factual errors.

“This is an opportunistic attempt to overcommit the state past the current governor鈥檚 tenure to a hostile, unhealthy and burdensome relationship with the city by bullying the new mayor into an untenable, undemocratic, and patronizing arrangement,” Tang said.

In response to the unified pushback, Schueler said she wondered how politics might influence a takeover鈥檚 effectiveness.

鈥淧roponents of takeover often point to school board dysfunction as the source of all the problems. What do they see as the source of the problem in Boston, and is that problem going to go away with takeover? It’s not getting rid of the board in this case.”

Receivership is almost always dreaded in local communities, but in Boston, there is another wrinkle: Even while electing Wu last fall, voters also demanding a return to elected school board members. Such a move would also inevitably limit the powers of the new mayor, who has said she favors a hybrid committee including both elected and appointed members. 

Will Austin, a former charter school leader who now serves as the CEO of the nonprofit , argued that while popular opinion might be firmly set against the appointment of a state receiver, state law was unambiguous in delineating Commissioner Riley鈥檚 powers to act in struggling school districts 鈥� of which Boston is undeniably one. 

“The statute and regulations are clear and blunt,鈥� Austin said. 鈥� A vote by the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education decides this 鈥� nothing else.”

But the relevant actors also face a ticking clock. In November, the state鈥檚 deep-blue electorate will choose a new governor; it is widely expected that Gov. Baker, a two-term Republican, will be succeeded by a progressive Democrat cut approximately from Wu鈥檚 cloth. Whoever that person is 鈥� Attorney General Maura Healey appears to be 鈥� will have little interest in being accused of disenfranchising Wu and the voters of Boston. So while an opportunity exists to set a receivership in motion, it could disappear before long. 

In the meantime, the district continues its reemergence from the COVID era. With to be the next superintendent, Wu and the school committee could race to make a hire before the state reaches a consensus.

In response to the newly released review, Reville said the situation demanded close cooperation between Boston and the state.

鈥溾�嬧�婽he report reiterates and describes problems that have persisted for a long time. The conversation needs to shift now from diagnosis to prescription. Neither the state nor the city is likely to be able to go it alone. The best chance for a remedy is a robust partnership between state and local leaders鈥nd the political will to overcome resistance to change.鈥�

The upside to these shake-ups, which have been implemented in high-profile districts like Detroit and Philadelphia, is that they can lead to better schools by elevating big problems over the heads of local figures who have failed to solve them. But research released this spring raises questions over whether those purported benefits are actually being realized.

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The study, through Brown University鈥檚 Annenberg Institute for School Reform, detects no evidence that takeovers improve student test scores on average, though its authors point to a wide range of other academic effects resulting from them. Co-author Beth Schueler, a professor of education and public policy at the University of Virginia鈥檚 Curry School of Education, said in an interview that the varying outcomes serve as a warning to state authorities considering takeovers.

鈥淚 don’t think anything about this study suggests that takeover cannot ever improve a district,鈥� Schueler said. 鈥淚 think it just means that leaders should be super-cautious about doing it.鈥�

The substance of the paper focuses on academic indicators, but some sections address the arguments leveled against takeovers on democratic grounds, most vocally by Rutgers University political scientist Domingo Morel. Morel鈥檚 own work has shown that in areas where takeovers have been aggressively implemented, such as in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, they have sometimes alienated residents and disempowered non-white politicians. In spite of those ill effects, a flood of research has shown improved school performance in the city, including higher college attendance.

The case of New Orleans is notably absent from the set of 35 districts studied by Schueler and co-author Joshua Bleiberg, a postdoctoral researcher at Brown. That group is restricted to districts that were subject to takeover between 2011 and 2016, which similarly excludes famous 鈥� and famously contentious 鈥� instances in Detroit, Philadelphia, and Newark, New Jersey. The districts that were subsumed within state control during that period were small by comparison, enrolling an average of just under 4,000 students (though this figure is itself over twice the size of the average non-takeover district).

To compare the results of takeovers in different states Schueler and Bleiberg used the Stanford Education Data Archive, a research tool that indexes all state test scores to the National Assessment of Educational Progress. Changes to scores in each of the 35 takeover districts were then measured against those in similar districts in their respective states that weren鈥檛 under state control.

Their analysis shows that, on average, districts that underwent takeovers did not see improvements on either math or English scores. In fact, scores in a number of districts declined over the first few takeover years, particularly in English. But as the authors argue, that average includes hugely different results from one district to another. Some districts made significant gains after being taken over, others experienced dramatic declines in achievement, and many clustered somewhere in the middle. A few districts saw progress in one subject but not the other.

Even in places where takeovers clearly lifted test scores, Schueler said, radically divergent local environments make it critical to study their lessons individually. Comparing the case of Lawrence, Massachusetts, a majority-Hispanic district whose successes , with New Orleans, an overwhelmingly African American district roughly three times its size, she pointed to major distinctions in state approaches: After the ravages of Katrina, the Recovery School District fired most New Orleans teachers and turned over school management to independent charter organizations. Lawrence did neither but still benefited in the years following its takeover.

鈥淭here are big differences across context and big differences in terms of what leaders did,鈥� Schueler said. 鈥淭hey took two very different routes, and both were able to make big improvements, at least in terms of test score outcomes. So it’s very hard to see patterns in the literature like that.鈥�

鈥楤e in the arena鈥�

Kenneth Wong, a Brown political scientist who has studied state takeovers for decades, said that specificity was key to understanding what choices and contingencies shape them. Calling the new working paper 鈥渞eally helpful in showing the landscape,鈥� he said the next step for students of education reform was to conduct more qualitative examinations of individual districts, which would allow politicians to compare their own school communities to places where takeovers led to improvement.

鈥淔or researchers, we kind of bundle everything 鈥� this is a condensed index of takeovers,鈥� Wong said. 鈥淏ut for policymakers to really benefit from the research, we need to deconstruct that broad bundle of 鈥榮tate takeover鈥� and try to identify the potential effects of certain local conditions.鈥�

Paymon Rouhanifard, who served as superintendent in Camden, New Jersey, after the district was brought under state control in 2013, agreed that takeovers exist on a 鈥減retty broad continuum鈥� in different legal and political environments. Among the ingredients for success, he argued, was clarity about when and under what conditions the intervention would end.

“I think minimally you need 5-8 years, but from the very jump, there has to be transparency around what the road back to local control looks like,鈥� Rouhanifard said. 鈥淚 don’t believe in interventions that have no end in sight, that are about the intervention and just the intervention itself.”

In time, many more examples will be available for study: As Schueler and Bleiberg note, there was an average of roughly six takeovers per year in the period between 2011 and 2016, compared with about four per year in the two decades that preceded it. The most publicized recent takeover has occurred in Wong鈥檚 home city of Providence, which was placed under state control in 2019 after years of academic failure and safety problems. Its initial phases have been rocky, with COVID interrupting its first year and brand-new governors and superintendents taking office since January. Wong predicted that the progress of the effort will become an inescapable factor in the 2022 governor鈥檚 race.

Even while acknowledging the increasing political complexities of takeovers, Wong said that their appeal would likely only grow with time.

鈥淭his shift toward a more executive-oriented reform agenda is not going to go away,鈥� he argued. 鈥淎nd takeover is part of that because it…offers more direct access [to schools],鈥� he said. 鈥淧oliticians can leverage their political capital, political will, to use this instrument because it legitimizes their involvement to address a particular set of problems.鈥�

That makes it important for takeover superintendents to engage constructively with schools and families, Rouhanifard argued. Asked to offer advice to someone leading a school district under state control, he said they should think of themselves as 鈥渢he mayors of their districts.鈥�

鈥淏e in the arena 鈥� the political arena, the community 鈥� and be a face of the work, because the distrust runs centuries deep,鈥� Rouhanifard counseled. 鈥淪o don’t be some technocratic, policy-oriented solution that is happening behind closed doors. You have to humanize it and meet people where they are.”