VAGO Report into the Tutor Learning Initiative

The Victorian Auditor General's Report assessed the effectiveness of the Tutor learning initiative, revealing key insights into its implementation and impact. Launched to address learning gaps exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic, the initiative aimed to provide targeted support to students through additional tutoring.

The report highlighted several findings. Firstly, it noted that while the initiative expanded rapidly, with significant government investment, there were challenges in ensuring equitable access across schools and regions. Issues such as recruitment and retention of qualified tutors, particularly in remote and disadvantaged areas, posed barriers to its effectiveness.   Irrespective of this, the report found that delivery of tutoring was timely in nearly all schools in 2023 and that school staff and principals have consistently provided positive feedback relating to the initiative.

Moreover, the report raised concerns about the monitoring and evaluation framework, pointing out gaps in data collection and performance metrics. This lack of robust monitoring hindered the ability to accurately assess the initiative’s overall impact on student outcomes.

Despite these challenges, the report acknowledged some positive outcomes, such as anecdotal evidence of student improvement and increased engagement. It recommended improvements in data collection, targeting resources to areas of greatest need, and enhancing support mechanisms for tutors to optimise the initiative’s effectiveness.

The department’s view is that the report shows that schools have worked hard to implement the program but there is a need to continue to refine the delivery of the program to ensure the maximum possible benefit is realised.  In response to the report, the department will consider ways to gather more detailed data on implementation practices to be able to provide more precise advice to schools on the practices that are proving most effective in different settings.

The Department’s response to the VAGO report on the Tutor Learning Initiative was published via the DE School Update and is available here.