HEPPNER — The Morrow County School District is looking to continue and expand its reading tutoring program in the fall.

The district implemented Ignite! Reading this spring. Erin Stocker, Morrow County School District executive director of human resources, boasts of the program, which offers one-on-one tutoring from Eastern Oregon University students, matching them with students in Morrow County. She said 30 of the district’s students now are in Ignite! and more should be entered into it at the start of the new school year.

That is, if data plays out the way she said she expects.

Ignite! students study with their tutors for 15 minutes a day, every school day, meeting online. Each session is different, she said, as tutoring sessions are tailored to fit each student’s needs.

Stocker said she has not seen the final report on the program’s success but has witnessed tutoring sessions and seen a lot of progress for most of the students. In sessions, she said, she has seen enthusiastic young people, who seem to want to be present.

According to Stocker, even the busiest 6-year-olds, who tend to have difficulty concentrating on studies, are sitting down and focusing on Ignite! work. And the students who are making the least amount of progress are not frequently attending the rest of their school.

“It makes sense,” she said.

If students are not present at school to do their Ignite! work, they will not benefit from it.

In addition to praising the program, Stocker also applauded Morrow County School District employees for their efforts.

“I have been extremely impressed with the administrators at the three schools that are implementing this,” she said.

According to Stocker, the program “fell into our lap” just before spring break. MCSD schools, then, had to “hit the ground running at the start of spring.” She said schools had a lot of extra work, satisfying the logistics of the program.

“Everything in education now is heavy, but they made it look like a light lift,” Stocker said.

EOU student says tutoring fun, helpful

Martin Heredia is one of the Eastern Oregon University students helping Morrow County students. An EOU junior, he is pursuing a career in teaching.

He said he meets with students through Zoom, allowing him to communicate with students from his home in La Grande to students in Morrow County. He tutors two fourth graders and two second graders.

The tutoring helps students, he said, and it benefits him, too. He said the Ignite! program gives him and other EOU students practice teaching reading. Other EOU Ignite! tutors also have four students each and concentrate on their needs in one-on-one sessions.

Heredia said he had a week of special training prior to starting with his students. He had to learn protocols and theory that allows tutors to maximize the education of short tutoring sessions, he said.

“We only get 15 minutes a day with the kids, but that goes such a long way, because you are working one on one,” he said. “You can see exactly what the kids are getting and what the students are struggling with,” he said. He said tutors can give corrective feedback right away.

Heredia said one of his favorite things about the program is employing certain “engagement strategies.” After a student does something well, he leads them in various cheers.

“The kids love it, and I love doing the cheer,” he said. “It gets them out of their comfort zone and makes them want to do the lessons.”

Having fun, he guides them from lesson to lesson, advancing them to increasingly difficult levels. And he said this is working; his students are making progress, as are other Morrow County students.

He said the 14 second grade students in the program were at least two grade levels below when starting Ignite!, and they were all able to pass their first progress monitoring assessment.

“So, 14 students covered 25% of their school year in 18 days, and that’s less than 4.5 hours of instruction, which is crazy,” he said.

Students who begin a school year with Ignite!, Heredia said, can close a gap of two-and-half years to one year.