Tutoring Shouldn’t Just Be for the Middle Class
The U.K. is embarking on an education experiment we should all watch closely. A national tutoring service could be a game changer for social mobility.
Closing the gap.
Photographer: Jacob King/PA Images
The dirty, little secret of middle-class parenting has been neither dirty, little nor secret for quite a while. Families who can afford tutoring often shell out because they find it delivers results. The proof is a global industry expected to reach $280 billion by 2027.
Now the U.K. is about to embark on the world’s first large-scale publicly funded experiment of mass tutoring to support those who can’t afford the privilege. In the coming months, a hastily assembled army of tutors will descend on state-funded schools in Britain seeking to reduce learning gaps widened by the pandemic. It should provide an impetus for rethinking some basic tenets of public education.