A Denver charter network is hiring parents to teach small groups of struggling readers, reports Elizabeth Hernandez for the Denver Post. Rocky Mountain Prep, which runs 12 schools, put recruits through a five-week training program at Colorado State, and will pay them $40,000 to $55,000 to work with students.
“Reading is justice,” said Estella Guzman, a former medical assistant with an 8-year-old daughter at Rocky Mountain Prep. She's considering a teaching career once the two-year pilot program is finished.
Tutors will provide small-group instruction using the scripted "95% reading curriculum," which bills itself as "explicit and systematic literacy instruction, backed by the science of reading." They'll also be asked to focus on students' individual needs.
The network is paying the tutors' salaries but hopes to get grants to keep the program going, and possibly expand it to include math.
Rocky Mountain Prep was inspired by Literacy Liberators, a parent tutoring program in Oakland which raised reading scores significantly, according to a 2023 report. The program, a partnership between the school district and the nonprofit Oakland REACH, has expanded to include math Liberators.
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