Audit: US tutoring is poorly enforced

WASHINGTON -- Failing US schools required by federal law to provide students with extra tutoring are not making sure the teaching is effective or in line with existing programs, congressional auditors reported.

Companies providing tutoring ``did not have any contact with teachers" in about 40 percent of districts surveyed, the Government Accountability Office said. Also, no states provide ``a conclusive assessment" of the value of the tutoring, the GAO said.

The report is the latest in a series by the GAO and others questioning the Bush administration's premise, as set out in the ``No Child Left Behind" law of 2002, that schools failing to meet federal standards will be improved by the mandated use of outside tutors.

``Students urgently need these services, and we can't tolerate fly-by-night tutoring that falls short of the meaningful help they need to succeed," Senator Edward M. Kennedy, Democrat of Massachusetts, said in response to the GAO report.

The ``No Child Left Behind" law is due for reauthorization by Congress next year, and leaders of both parties said they would need to fix problems with the tutoring requirement.

The law requires annual testing of students in subjects such as math and reading. School districts that fail to meet testing standards for two consecutive years must let students transfer to a different school in the district, then pay for tutoring in the third year. The law also ties compliance to the distribution of about $13 billion in annual federal school aid.

The law requires failing schools to hire outside tutors, though the Bush administration last month agreed to expand an exemption that lets some low-performing public schools tutor their students rather than rely on private companies or competing schools.

Previous GAO reports noted problems with tutoring that include the failure of schools to promptly notify parents of eligible children and that some districts, such as in rural areas, are having trouble finding and hiring tutors.

The report yesterday said about 70 percent of states face difficulty coordinating between tutoring providers and schools.

The GAO also found that 19 percent of students eligible for tutoring in the 2004-05 school year received it, up from 12 percent the previous year. An estimated 20 percent of school districts required by law to offer the tutoring had no students receiving it, the GAO said.

The House Committee on Education and the Workforce will investigate why such services are underused, said the panel's chairman, Representative Buck McKeon, Republican of California.

``More and more evidence has emerged that this feature is not being utilized as widely as it should be," McKeon said in a statement.