Skip to main content
Add as a preferred source on Google


Gates Foundation Funds Tutor.com Research for Math Teacher Training

  • By Dian Schaffhauser
  • 01/05/11

A company that provides online tutoring services has received a grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to create an on-demand professional development system specifically to train middle school and high school math teachers.

Tutor.com will be developing the program to research the effects of connecting math teachers to an online teaching coach for private help in a Web-based classroom whenever they need additional support. A third-party evaluator will then design and complete a study to measure the effectiveness of the project. This research is scheduled to be published at the end of 2012.

The company said it will work with school administrators and classroom teachers to identify the specific areas of focus for the program. One-to-one sessions may include working on deeper understanding of curriculum content, mastering teaching techniques, or reviewing and refining lesson plans to achieve better results. The idea is to integrate the lessons into a teacher's work day to provide ongoing support as he or she needs it.

The professional development will be tied to the use of Tutor.com's tutoring services for the students in that teacher's classes. Students will be able to connect to online tutors for personal assistance with homework or studying for an exam. The environment provides an online classroom with an interactive whiteboard, application and file sharing, and co-browsing. Sessions are saved and available to teachers for review. Teachers will then be able to receive summary reports to better understand what topics in the curriculum are most difficult for the students.

"Over six million times, our online tutors and technology have helped students overcome their challenges with on-demand one-to-one help," said Tutor.com CEO George Cigale. "We now have the opportunity to offer educators a new model for teacher support, which could influence professional development practices and impact classroom teaching for the coming decades."

Tutor.com is seeking school districts that want to be considered as candidates for participation in the program. More information is available at tutor.com/ondemandpd.

About the Author

Dian Schaffhauser is a former senior contributing editor for 1105 Media's education publications THE Journal, Campus Technology and Spaces4Learning.

Featured

  • Students with backpacks walk down a sunlit school hallway

    SchoolStatus Attend Update Adds Time-Based Attendance Tracking

    K-12 attendance solution provider SchoolStatus has announced an enhancement to its Attend product, adding flexible, time-based attendance tracking that measures missed learning time rather than just full-day absences.

  • abstract smartphone translucent screen displaying AI interface

    Apple Unveils Redesigned Siri AI

    At its recent Worldwide Developers Conference, Apple announced Siri AI, a redesigned version of its voice assistant that Apple describes in its own announcement as "a profoundly more capable and personal assistant." The update is intended to make Siri more conversational, more context-aware, and more useful across iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch, and Vision Pro.

  • school kids using laptop computer together in classroom

    New CoSN Report Offers Guidance on Responsible Technology Use in Schools

    A new resource from CoSN provides guidelines for creating responsible technology use policies and supporting digital citizenship in schools and districts.

  • Neon blue security locks with a single red highlight

    With AI, Cybersecurity Focus Shifts from Finding Flaws to Fixing Them

    For decades, one of cybersecurity's biggest challenges has been finding vulnerabilities before attackers do. A growing number of security professionals now say artificial intelligence is changing that equation, shifting the focus from discovering flaws to fixing them quickly enough to prevent exploitation.