Tutoring in Transition: Landmark Report Reveals the Future of K-12 Tutoring

Pearl's State of Tutoring 2025 report reveals how districts are shifting from short-term recovery efforts to sustainable, data-driven instructional strategies.

RICHMOND, Va., Nov. 5, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- Pearl, the trusted technology infrastructure behind many of the nation's most effective tutoring initiatives, today released The State of Tutoring 2025: Tutoring in Transition, an inaugural report that explores how tutoring has evolved since the pandemic and where it's heading next. Drawing on interviews with more than 20 state and district leaders, researchers, and providers and an analysis of over 1 million anonymized tutoring sessions, the report captures a field in flux, moving from emergency response to enduring strategy.

The findings show that while tutoring remains one of the most effective interventions for accelerating student learning, its future depends on how schools approach sustainability, data, and workforce development.

"Tutoring works—and now we know more than ever about what makes it work," said John Failla, CEO of Pearl. "This report shows that districts aren't just asking if tutoring helps. They're asking how to make it sustainable, accountable, and deeply connected to classroom instruction."

Key Insights from the Report

• Tutoring has flipped from virtual to in-person: K-12 tutoring has undergone a dramatic shift from predominantly virtual to mostly in-person delivery since 2020.
• Data is becoming tutoring's backbone: As districts face tighter budgets, leaders are increasingly using tutoring data to measure impact, justify continued investment, and align funding with proven outcomes. The report highlights how data-rich systems enable educators to evaluate which programs drive growth and make evidence-based decisions about what to sustain post-ESSER.
• Workforce models are evolving: Districts increasingly see tutoring as a teacher pipeline and retention strategy, with programs offering meaningful roles for paraprofessionals, retirees, and aspiring educators.
• AI and innovation hold promise, but aren't replacements: Education leaders are piloting AI "co-pilots" that support tutors with real-time instructional prompts, showing potential to scale high-impact practices without sacrificing the human connection that defines effective tutoring.

The report outlines two diverging futures for K-12 tutoring. In one, tutoring remains a temporary recovery effort that fades as stimulus dollars end. In the other, it becomes a lasting part of the instructional core—supported by strong data systems, aligned funding, and intentional design.

As Dr. Scott Muri, Superintendent Emeritus of Ector County ISD, writes in the report's foreword, "We proved that virtual tutoring can work. We showed that outcomes-based contracting fosters clarity, commitment, and mutual accountability. We learned that engagement—not just attendance—matters. And we saw what's possible when educators, providers, researchers, and communities rally around a shared mission."

The challenge ahead is ensuring that those principles, accountability, data, and design, become standard infrastructure of every tutoring program, rather than exceptions born of crisis.

The State of Tutoring 2025: Tutoring in Transition was developed by Whiteboard Advisors in partnership with Pearl. The report draws on qualitative and quantitative insights collected between August and October 2025, including interviews with more than 20 state and district leaders, nonprofit directors, researchers, and provider executives. The report also incorporates data from over 1 million virtual tutoring sessions logged in Pearl's Tutor Management System between 2020 and 2025—one of the nation's most comprehensive datasets of anonymized tutoring sessions.

Read the full report here.

About Pearl 
Pearl is the trusted technology infrastructure behind many of the nation's most effective tutoring initiatives. Pearl's Tutor Management System and Data Hub empower states, districts, and providers to design, manage, and measure high-dosage tutoring at scale. Recognized by TIME as one of the Top EdTech Companies of 2025, Pearl unifies scheduling, attendance, and outcomes data in real time—turning tutoring from a program into a system of continuous improvement. Learn more at www.poweredbypearl.com

SOURCE Pearl