Context matters: Experimental evaluation of home-based tutoring for youth in foster care

A large body of work has documented significant educational delays and other challenges among children in foster care. In response, child welfare agencies have developed different policies and practices to help monitor, support, and advocate for foster children's educational needs. An important example of these efforts is tutoring programs for children in foster care. The current study uses random assignment to evaluate the impact of an individualized, home-based tutoring program on the academic performance and educational outcomes of a group of adolescent foster youth in Los Angeles County, CA. Data were collected via multi-wave, in-person interviews of 465 foster youth. No statistically significant impacts are found on any included measures of academic ability or other educational outcomes. Substantial proportions of both control and program groups report receipt of tutoring from school, which may partly account for the finding of no effect.