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Improving the educational outcomes for students who are at risk for academic failure is an important issue for educators and policymakers, Recently, before- and after-school tutoring programs have been identified as having the potential to turn academic failure into academic success. Two studies were conducted to determine the efficacy of an after-school tutoring program. Results of the studies showed that at-risk students and students with learning disabilities who were failing classes could earn average or better grades on quizzes and tests if they had the support of trained adult tutors. Additionally, researchers found that tutors could teach strategies during their tutoring sessions and that students could learn the strategies while they worked on their class assignments. Finally, researchers found that some students continued to be successful after tutoring ended, indicating that they were able to use the strategy they had learned in a
FOR A VARIETY OF COMPLEX INDIVIDUAL INSTRUCtional, and societal reasons, some children and adolescents experience difficulty attaining the academic and social competencies required for successful participation in school and society. As a result, they face the possibility of being undereducated, underemployed, and underprepared to participate successfully in the 21 st century (Blackorby & Wagner, 1996; Mack & Wiltrout, 1998; Murry, Goldstein, & Edgar, 1997; Sitlington & Frank, 1990). Sizer (1996) feared that society's failure to address the needs of these children dooms many of them to join the ranks of teenagers "who mindlessly wander around the malls and live shamelessly off other people" (p. 146).
In response to this serious challenge, parents, educators, and policymakers are searching for ways to increase the academic and social competence of students. Increasingly, these groups and the popular press are advocating after-school tutoring programs in which skilled teachers, paraeducators, or other adults provide one-to-one support as one way to reduce the gap between what students are expected to know and to be able to do in the 21st century and what they actually know and are able to do (e.g., Adler, 1998; Farr, 1998; Hancock, 1994; Hock, Schumaker, & Deshler, 1998; Kaufmann & Adema, 1998; Pressley & McCormick, 1995; Tollefson, 1997).
Nevertheless, assuming that all after-school tutoring programs will result in the development of skilled and independent learners may be overly optimistic. Indeed,...