Study finds students with Experience Corps tutors make 60 percent more progress in critical read...(ry panel and a vice president at Mathema...),Health

Experience Corps has 2,000 tutors helping 20,000 students in 23 U.S. cities, including Annapolis, MD; Baltimore City and County; Beaumont, TX; Boston; Cleveland; Evansville, IN; Grand Rapids, MI; Marin, CA; Mesa, AZ; Minneapolis; New Haven, CT; New York City; Oakland, CA; Philadelphia; Port Arthur, TX; Portland, OR; Revere, MA; San Francisco; St. Paul, MN; Tempe, AZ; Tucson, AZ; and Washington, DC.

"Experience Corps works because Experience Corps members are carefully screened and trained to support local literacy instruction," said Lester Strong, the program's CEO. "Plus most Experience Corps members come from the neighborhoods where they serve. They know these kids, they believe in these kids, and they see a future in them.

"Experience Corps puts a growing national resource, experienced Americans, to work on a pressing national need giving all students the reading skills they need to succeed," Strong continued. "There's no shortage of older adults nearly 10,000 Americans turn 60 every day and no shortage of kids who need help half of our urban students never graduate from high school. We could be doing so much more to put these two generations together."

To download a copy of the research findings, please go to http://csd.wustl.edu/Publications/Documents/RP09-01.pdf.

In 2006, researchers at the Center for Social Development at Washington University's Brown School of Social Work were awarded a grant from The Atlantic Philanthropies to evaluate the effects of the Experience Corps program on student reading outcomes. Mathematica Policy Research, Inc. (MPR) provided data collection services.

Three school systems agreed to be part of the study, and 23 schools in Boston, New York City and Port Arthur, Texas, participated. At the beginning of th
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