Our unique, holistic, intensive, multi-sensory, proven curriculum makes it possible for low-literacy students to become proficient readers. Our students work one-on-one with tutors, five days per week in order to achieve proficiency.

An alarming number of students are falling into the literacy gap, reading a grade level or more behind. In addition, roughly 43 million adults in our country possess low literacy skills or are functionally illiterate according to the NCES – and data indicates that this number is going to grow if significant changes do not occur.

It doesn’t have to be this way.

When cofounder and CEO Pamela Good sought to meet the basic needs of students in a single elementary school back in 1999, it became clear that many needed more than the basics. Students were not reading at grade level and needed individualized literacy intervention. In response, the curriculum and methodology of Beyond Basics was developed.

More than two decades later, multiple schools and hundreds of students work with Beyond Basics, improving their reading skills in an average of six weeks. This student response, alongside the diligent efforts of school partners, leads us to believe that illiteracy is the most solvable problem individuals and communities face in the United States.

The payoff to addressing the literacy crisis is significant. For individuals, it opens doors to textbooks and written instructions, job and college applications. For communities, higher literacy rates mean lower rates of poverty, incarceration, unemployment and underemployment. Literacy opens the door to life’s beautiful possibilities.

Our certified tutors come from all walks of life. Some are retired teachers, others are recent college grads, and some are even current college students. In order to achieve certification, our tutors must undergo two weeks of in-depth training to gain a profound understanding of the curriculum and methodology that we use.

We go where they show up. We offer traditional in person tutoring as well as virtual online tutoring.

Primarily, tutoring occurs within school buildings due to our partnerships with school districts. Tutoring also takes place at other sites like the Durfee Innovation Society in Detroit and the Dream Center of Pontiac.

We also offer the option to tutor from home – which is made possible by our virtual tutoring platform.

In 2016, Dr. D. Carl Freeman of Wayne State University and Dr. Hilary Horn Ratner conducted a blind study in order to analyze the effectiveness of the Beyond Basics programs. This is a direct quote from Dr. Freeman in his results report:

“The data are unequivocal. Students who participate in the Beyond Basics reading program made more than twice the progress in reading comprehension as was made by the control group, and passage comprehension increased more than threefold.”

As well, the outpouring of positive feedback from students, parents, teachers, and principals describing how the program has changed a student's life for the better, supports and validates the scientific results. As one student said, "Now that I can read, I want to pay it forward, and make sure the next generation can, too."

You can enroll your child by visiting the Online Tutoring page or you can contact us for more information at info@beyondbasics.org or (248)-250-9304.

The program does not have an age limit. We have worked with students from kindergarten through older citizens.