Dent-Phelps R-3 Schools to provide no-cost online tutoring to students

SALEM, Mo, — The Dent-Phelps R-3 School District and Varsity Tutors have announced a partnership through June 2030 to provide online tutoring, at no cost to the students in Salem, Missouri.

“The tutoring is done virtually, so you’re engaging with a browser, a phone, etc.,” Anthony Salcito with Varsity Tutors said. “You can ask questions to the tutor you want. The tutor won’t see your video, but you can type a question.”

Students will get a password-protected login and be able to access a multitude of options to expand their learning.

The tutoring is available online 24/7.

“It’s on demand, and it’s live chat to help with their assignments, and they can actually,  if they have problems, they can upload them and get and get help with those,” Dr. Karla Tiefenthaler, Principal of Dent-Phelps R-3 Schools said.

Tiefenthaler says the district says the summertime is a huge factor in academics.

“One thing that we did notice, and we’ve known this for years and educators understand that summertime, for the most part, equals learning loss,” Tiefenthaler said. “That was something that we noticed year after year. Varsity Tutors provides that extra support during the summer to our families and hopefully will lessen that learning loss and help us close some gaps.”

So how is Varsity Tutors able to provide free tutoring for nearly five and a half years to a district of nearly 300 students?

Varsity Tutors also offers a more focused tutoring that has a fee, and its that excess revenue that allows them to provide the no-cost tutoring.

“It is actually aggregated from all of the revenue that we generate across paid members of the service,” Anthony Salcito with Varsity Tutors said. “Families have been paying us to deliver services, districts, players to do high-dosage tutoring, and we’ve built out a series of assets that we’re able to send to Dent-Phelps, as well as districts across Missouri at no cost.”

Resources provided to the students include 24/7 On-Demand Chat Tutoring, On-Demand Essay Review, SAT and ACT test prep, self-study courses, college and career readiness resources, and more.

“A lot of times that’s a big confidence builder for students. When they have [this as an option], they are able to have contact with a helper outside of school hours when teachers aren’t available and maybe parents aren’t available for whatever reason,” Tiefenthaler said.

Tiefenthaler says the program is already online and ready for parents and students.

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