Increasing SES Program Effectiveness

Through Partner Feedback: Providence and Central Falls Rhode Island Administrator Focus Group

Progress in a Challenging Environment

The Knowledge Learning Corporation CHAMPIONS Tutoring Program, formerly EdSolutions, and our school district partners recognize the challenges we face, in partnership, to achieve Supplemental Educational Services (SES) goals. Our management and administrative teams understand the enormity of our task—and from here we can start to make things better. That's why the CHAMPIONS Tutoring Program recently conducted a Client Focus Group with Providence and Central Falls, Rhode Island district personnel, principals, teachers and staff. The Focus Group's goal is to strengthen district and CHAMPIONS Tutoring Program synergies, ensuring that we examine every detail of our holistic program offerings with the microscope of careful thought, concern, community and partnership.

Asking the Right Questions

On Thursday, May 11, 2006, an open format provoked a meaningful discussion. Curtis Peace, CHAMPIONS Tutoring Program's District Manager of Community Relations and Outreach, served as facilitator. Questions included the following: Were you satisfied with the program? Were you pleased with the level of communication? Were you satisfied with the materials? What is your perception of the curriculum? How can we help you improve parent involvement and program awareness? How can we partner with you to increase attendance during the after-school tutorial session? How would you rate our program's quality? Did the CHAMPIONS Tutoring Program impact your students' achievement?

Understanding Partner Needs

These questions helped us get right to the heart of the matter—and quickly! Successes included that the CHAMPIONS curriculum serves as an interactive, learning tool for the children enrolled in our program. One of the prinicipals was elated that we hired the school's bilingual school secretary to field parent/guardian questions. This in itself improved communication with our program's parents. Other comments included significant improvement in mangement compared to prior years and praise for the program administrator's excellent and consistent job performance. Also, one principal appreciated the fact that he did not have to monitor our program as much other SES programs. Moreover, the effective, quick response time and proactive communication that our program delivered was superior on all levels.

Overall, the group had great comments regarding curriculum. However, a few concerns emerged, including that our Read Naturally curriculum could be enhanced. The group elaborated, saying that the tape players occassionally had operating glitches, stories sometimes appeared to not match the tapes and that it would be helpful to develop answer keys to address higher learning skill-building. Other comments on curriculum included a need for more reading materials and for delivering our curriculum according to Pacing Guides and GLEs.

When asked about parental involvement and program awareness, suggestions included that we should continue to participate in parent information nights and that we should contact parents as soon as we are provided a list of students signed up for the CHAMPIONS Tutoring Program. Other recommendations included hosting a parent orientation meeting at the beginning of our program and sponsoring dual parent/teacher conferences during regularly scheduled parent/teacher conferences. Some focus group attendees suggested that we partner with community organizations to offer our tutorial services with other enrichment services to increase attendance and also incorporate positive reinforcement to motivate student learning.

When the group was asked to rate our program as good, average or poor, some great feedback emerged. Many felt that we were very good and that feedback from our Central Falls and Providence parents indicates we are greatly appreciated. One of the District personnel mentioned that we should be "tooting our horn" more in the community and with other districts because of our holistic approach to tutoring (our free parent workshops, newsletters and focus groups).

Finding Solutions Together

Reflecting after the session the CHAMPIONS Tutoring Program District Manager of Operations Sheryl Ryan was pleased to note opportunities for new achievement between the Central Falls and Providence School Districts in partnership with the CHAMPIONS Tutoring Program:

"We are grateful for all of the candid feedback that the focus group attendees offered, and we consider each comment with the utmost seriousness. Only through open forums such as this can we hope to manage and surmount the challenges we face each day. Our goal is to meet the needs of all children and families we serve, truly leaving no child behind. We can only accomplish our objective by bringing every resource to bear. This is our continuing goal."