Success for All (SFA) is a comprehensive school reform program designed to ensure academic success for children in disadvantaged schools in the US. It provides schools with a reading curriculum that emphasizes the use of cooperative learning and tutoring sessions for struggling students. Extensive professional development and coaching by a facilitator is provided to teachers to support the implementation of all program components. The reading approach used in Success for All has been recently translated and adapted to the Dutch context.
A quasi-experimental study evaluated the effects of the adapted SFA version in the Netherlands. Seven schools implementing the intervention were matched with four schools that continued with the usual practice. A total of 1,011 students from 61 classes in grades 1-3 participated in the study, with 331 students receiving the intervention for three years (grades 1-3), 339 for two years (grades 1-2), and 341 for one year (grade 1). Reading comprehension and reading fluency measures were administered before and after the program implementation. The intervention showed significant positive results on reading fluency for first grade students, with a significant effect size of +0.40. The effect for economically disadvantaged students was even higher, with an effect size of +0.63. No impacts were found for second and third grade students, or for comprehension. The authors noted that schools implemented only some of the reading components of the Success for All model. Grouping strategies, designed to increase teacher instructional time and focus, were not implemented, and tutoring was provided at lower than planned levels. In addition, a decrease of commitment to the project by school staff members occurred during the second and third years of the project. U.S. studies of the full model had substantially stronger results, and it is hypothesized that, in this study, weaker impacts were found because many adaptations were made to the original SFA program to make it suitable for the Dutch context, and important components could not be included.
Source: Veldman, M. A., Hingstman, M., & de Boer, H. (2024). Effects of the comprehensive school reform program Success for All on students’ reading skills in Dutch schools. School Effectiveness and School Improvement, 35(3), 318–341. https://doi.org/10.1080/09243453.2024.2385926