Study finds students with Experience Corps tutors make 60% more progress in critical reading skills than students without tutors
Tutoring children in and after school isn’t new, but how much does it really help in critical areas like reading? Rigorous new research from Washington University in St. Louis shows significant gains from a national service program that trains experienced Americans to help low-income children one-on-one in urban public schools. The central finding: Over a single school year, students with Experience Corps tutors made over 60 percent more progress in learning two critical reading skills — sounding out new words and reading comprehension — than similar students not served by the program.
Entrepreneurs awarded $75,000 in annual Olin Cup competition
An on-line tutoring service and a device designed to make custom-fit earphones are the winners of the 2008 Olin Cup competition for entrepreneurs presented by the Olin Business School and Skandalaris Center at Washington University in St. Louis. The two winning companies, Virtual Nerd and Verto, emerged from an original field of 38 entrants to earn a $70,000 investment award and a $5000 cash prize respectively.