Boosting Academic Performance through Individualized Tutoring

• In Event: Tailored Instruction at Scale: Harnessing A.I. to Close Learning Gaps

Proposal

Saga Education is a national leader in high-impact, in-school tutoring. Educational inequity doesn’t have to be a fact. We know every student is capable of earning success in school and life but often do not receive the individualized support they deserve. Implementing academic interventions that address the inequities faced by historically marginalized students continues to be one of our nation’s most urgent challenges. While educators and students alike have experienced many unprecedented challenges recently, educators continue to report that their top concern is students falling behind in math. This concern is heightened for educators in high-poverty districts who predominantly teach students of color. At Saga Education, we leverage the best of technology and human instruction to maximize learning, improve student confidence, and help students feel connected to a caring adult in school.

Saga’s tutors can use our platform to capture high-quality audio recordings are being captured and turned into high-quality (AI) transcripts of sessions. This allows us, the tutors, and their coaches to better understand and assess the dimensions of effective tutoring and to support highly individualized coaching of tutors. Saga is harnessing AI to close learning gaps by supporting and augmenting (but not attempting to replace) critical human relationships.

Our current efforts are focused on using AI to determine what effective tutoring is for all kinds of students, to reduce administrative tasks, to accelerate tutor professional development, and to successfully implement its tutoring model in other cultural contexts. Through these AI-driven innovations, Saga not only enhances the quality and scalability of its tutoring model but also ensures that instruction is personalized, culturally responsive, and linguistically accessible. This strategic use of AI helps close learning gaps for historically underserved students, driving equitable educational outcomes in diverse learning environments.

Our hybrid human-AI tutoring platform, being developed with the University of Colorado and others, supports six critical aspects of tutoring work: (1) selecting tasks with high cognitive demand based on student knowledge and engagement; (2) facilitating rich math-focused discussions; (3) building strong relationships among students and tutors; (4) providing feedback and guidance to enhance tutoring and learning processes; (5) leveraging the power of collaboration for promoting deeper thinking and building community; and (6) enabling tutors and coaches to engage in data-driven reflection and continuous improvement.

This includes offering data-driven advice on crucial aspects of tutoring, such as relationship-building with students, managing conversations (and who is talking) to foster engagement, and facilitating productive struggle to help students build resilience and problem-solving skills. AI-generated insights enable new tutors to refine their techniques and consistently deliver high-quality tutoring experiences that meet the diverse needs of students.

Additionally, AI will be pivotal in adapting Saga’s tutoring model to different cultural contexts, such as Puerto Rico. By leveraging AI, Saga will tailor math problems to align with students’ interests, cultural backgrounds, and real-world experiences, making learning more relevant and engaging.

Author

• Adriana Colom Cruz, Saga Education