CHICAGO — The Chicago Board of Education authorized a new agreement for the tutoring program partnership between Chicago Public Schools and Saga Education at its July 30, 2026 meeting. Saga will provide high-impact math tutoring to 1,800 students across the district in the 2026-2027 school year. 

High-impact tutoring by Saga Education in CPS since 2015 has helped thousands of struggling math students gain confidence, close learning gaps, and improve their academic performance by working with caring, knowledgeable tutors consistently throughout the school year. Rigorous independent research conducted by the University of Chicago Education Lab showed that Chicago Public School students who participated in Saga Education algebra tutoring gained 1 to 2.5 years of additional math learning in a single academic year and reduced math-related failures by up to 63 percent.

On July 8, Dr. Corey Morrison, executive director of Science Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) in CPS’ Department of Teaching and Learning, appeared before the Chicago Board of Education agenda review committee meeting to recommend renewing the contract with Saga for the 2026-2027 school year. At the meeting, he told the board that Saga tutoring “is our most effective high school intervention for students that are furthest from opportunity. It has improved not only test scores, but grades and reduced course failures.” He noted that principals value the program’s ability to build meaningful, trusting relationships with tutors and boost student confidence and enthusiasm. (Click here to watch Dr. Morrison’s comments at the meeting.)

Morrison added that “in CPS’ most recent analysis, we see 6 percentile growth compared to 1.7 for peers in the same building who didn’t receive Saga, and 1.4 across the district.” He also noted that nearly 21 percent of students moved up a level in their intervention tier because of tutoring with Saga, compared with 12 percent of students across the district. Morrison also highlighted the program’s impact on black students – 91 percent of black students in Saga tutoring earned a C or higher in their general math class, compared with 75 percent across the district.   

“Saga’s work in Chicago has always been about helping students feel capable, supported, and ready to succeed in the classroom,” said Alan PG Safran, CEO and co-founder of Saga Education. “We’re grateful for the chance to continue working alongside CPS school leaders and teachers. We’re honored to keep showing up for CPS students, helping them close math learning gaps and believe in their own potential.”

Since 2014, Saga Education, the nation’s non-profit leader in high-impact, in-school-day math tutoring, has provided intensive, high-dosage math tutoring to more than 16,000 students in grades 9 and 10 in Chicago Public Schools. 

Saga hires and supervises tutors through the CPS partnership as a class period for credit. Depending on the school, students receive tutoring via several different models: in-person or with a live-online tutor. A Saga-employed site coordinator supervises tutors and, where tutors deliver remote tutoring sessions, is also available in the classroom to facilitate student learning and address technical issues. Saga tutors and students who participate in live-online tutoring use Saga Connect, a platform developed by Saga to host interactive math tutoring sessions.

After promising results from the initial 2012-13 pilot at Harper High School run by John Wolf of the University of Chicago Education Lab, CPS formed a long-term partnership with Saga Education, where tutoring was expanded to 12 district schools in 2014, then 15, then several dozen.

Saga, the UChicago Education Lab, and CPS have partnered on randomized controlled trials to understand the effectiveness of high-impact math tutoring on student learning. The Education Lab, together with CPS and Saga, conducted studies looking at a variety of program model designs; in-person, live-online tutoring, blended tutoring models, and models using 2:1, 3:1 and 4:1 student-to-tutor ratios. 

Saga Education also serves as the district partner in Baltimore City Public Schools and Prince George’s (MD) Public Schools, operating the same model as CPS.  Since its founding in 2014, Saga has served over 65,000 students nationwide with high-impact tutoring.