Support Helping Education

Since the beginning of the pandemic, Helping Education has collaborated with educators, parents, and caregivers to provide them with free training & programming to support their students. Beginning in March 2020, we quickly developed a virtual approach to our evidence-based and internationally used HELPS reading fluency intervention that we have been offering for more than a decade to improve student reading outcomes. 

Over the summer of 2020, our staff and volunteers implemented our newly developed Virtual HELPS program in four different locations around the United States and worked with even more school districts and partner organizations to plan for virtual HELPS support to take place internationally during the 2020-2021 school year. These pilot tests suggested it was as effective as our thoroughly researched in-person version of HELPS, and our continued work using Virtual HELPS with hundreds of students in the 20-21 school year has further supported the positive impact of Virtual HELPS.

Consistent with our work since Helping Education was founded, we have continued to promote educational equity by prioritizing our support for students and families who are historically underserved, such as students and families of color and/or those who are economically disadvantaged.

When we think back on this past year, we will always remember the partnerships we developed or strengthened with deeply dedicated educators, parents, and volunteers. Just over the past year alone we:

• Provided more than 200 parents with trainings and support to use our PASTEL program
• Trained more than 400 volunteer tutors to use our Virtual HELPS program
• Provided nearly 1,000 students with HELPS or AMPPS tutoring sessions
• Adapted to COVID-safe programming for all the learners we support, including adults who are currently incarcerated and supported with our evidence-based Motheread/Fatheread programming
• Reached more than 10,000 educators as they attended our online trainings or downloaded our freely available and research-supported programs

What Makes Us Unique: Through collaborative partnerships, Helping Education provides programs and services that are free or low cost and meaningfully advance learning outcomes for students from birth through adulthood. To promote educational equity, we focus our efforts on partnering with educators and community organizations that serve a high percentage of students who are economically disadvantaged and/or have been historically underserved.

Although we improve student learning through school-based programming, we also have evidence-based and culturally relevant programs that allow parents and caregivers to meaningfully enhance their child’s literacy skills at home, in childcare centers, and in community settings. The beneficial effects of our programs are largely attributed to our comprehensive approach to program development and evaluation, often requiring 5+ years of ongoing research and development before the programs are offered nationally and internationally. Click here to learn more about our programs and services. 

If you agree that our programs and services are valuable -- and that our unique approach to collaborative partnerships and free access to programs are significantly improving learning and life opportunities for tens of thousands of individuals -- we ask you to consider supporting our mission.