UNICEF is predicting an 80% learning poverty rate for Latin America. The most disadvantaged children have been disproportionately affected by the school closures during the pandemic and, indeed, School the World’s Spring 2022 diagnostic testing of thousands of children in rural Guatemala suggested a 93-94% learning poverty rate for Latin America’s most disadvantaged 5th grade students.
At School the World, we adapted Pratham's Teaching at the Right Level model to our local contexts to create the Accelerated Learning Recovery program. We hire and train tutors in the methodology and send enough tutors to each school in the cohort to provide each student with five hours of small group tutoring per week over six months. Students are then evaluated and divided into small groups according to their learning level. Tutors use play as one of the main methods to strengthen student's literacy and numeracy skills.
Students who participated in Accelerated Learning Recovery in 2022 & 2023 showed statistically significant gains in both reading and math.
For example:
The percentage of 2nd grade students who cannot read a word dropped 57% in Guatemala (from 88% to 31%), 27% in Honduras (from 97% to 70%) and 21% in Panama (from 75% to 54%).
These are just some examples. We have extensive data available for both reading and math for each grade participating in the program.
In 2022, School the World hired and trained 47 tutors to work with 2,557 students from Guatemala, Honduras, and Panama.
Given the learning levels revealed through testing and the significant gains achieved after six months of the tutoring (see above), the Tinker Foundation awarded us funding to continue the program with the first cohort for two more years.
With other funders, we have added new cohorts in 2023. In total, we have hired and trained 79 tutors working with 5,644 students.
We have the goal of growing our tutoring coverage by 100% or more in 2024, funding dependent.
Identify the total population to be addressed with the program, and a leadership team to undertake it’s execution as a first step.
Once you have the general information of the target group, contact Bianca Argueta, our Monitoring & Evaluation Regional Director to evaluate together if our methodology is adequate to your needs and context. See also the Implementation section below.
