PORT RICHEY, Fla. — The first school in the state to test out a new literacy tutoring program is right here in Pasco County.
Dayspring Academy on Tuesday released results from the first few months of using the Ignite Reading program, which is part of an initiative Gov. Ron Desantis signed into law last year. It establishes a statewide tutoring program administered by the University of Florida Lastinger Center for Learning.
Students in kindergarten at the Dayspring Academy have one teacher physically in the classroom with them, and they essentially have four more on their laptop screens.
“It’s one on one. Learners get 15 minutes each day with a virtual tutor, and they work specifically. It’s differentiated for each learner, which is great, and that way they’re able to work on reading skills specific to what’s needed for them,” said Wendy Finlay, the principal of Dayspring Academy’s Harmony campus.
She says they started using Ignite Reading in February, and even in this short amount of time, students have shown tremendous gains in reading.
“According to the state standards, we’ve had learners who have moved from well below grade level to on grade level and even above grade level,” Finlay said.
Each day, during their literacy block at school, students meet with their tutor virtually.
“They get the same tutor each day, so they’ve built relationships with these tutors just like they’ve built relationships with their classroom teachers,” she said.
Thanks to all of the tutors in the classroom each day, students are receiving even more one-on-one attention, with the goal being to take students from learning to read, to reading to learn.
Finlay says since implementing the Ignite Reading tutoring program, students who had previously scored the lowest in reading in state testing are now reading at, or above grade level. She says they offer a similar tutoring program for math.
