HOSTS leverages mentoring to deliver student success.

HOSTS Learning (Vancouver, WA) is one of those well-kept secrets. The 32-year old company delivers personalized services that accelerate student achievement in reading and math. Its research-based learning systems mesh well with the requirements of NCLB and the company has begun to expand and reconfigure its product offerings to meet the schools' need for improved student achievement.

HOSTSLink, designed for use with low-performing students, is a structured mentoring program in Readiness, Language Arts, Math, Spanish Readiness, and Spanish Language Arts that supplements the school's core curriculum. A specially trained HOSTS teacher oversees initial student assessments, uses the HOSTS software to generate individualized learning plans that are aligned with the district's standards and resources, and develops weekly lesson plans based on the students' instructional needs. When mentors arrive, they have detailed daily plans, correlated to resources readily available in the school and supplemented by HOSTS support materials that make their 30-minute, one-on-one sessions highly productive. HOSTS Learning's offerings have been proven to increase student reading levels and grade level gains up to two or more levels in a single school year.

Michael Williamson, Chief Academic Officer at HOSTS, says that when principals realize that the system can generate significant learning results at a lower cost than other one-on-one intervention programs, as well as provide a structured way to handle a community-based mentoring program, they are quick to see the value. And people stay with the program. HOSTS has a 85% ...