A new program at Lac Seul First Nation’s schools wants to ensure that, when it comes to literacy and reading skills, no child gets left behind.

While the pandemic has negatively affected early learning and literacy for many children across the country, First Nations communities have seen the effects more than most. In a report issued to Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (EMRIP), Human Rights Watch states, in part, “The Covid-19 pandemic, and related school closures, has negatively affected children’s right to a quality education around the world. Indigenous children—both those living in and outside of Indigenous communities—frequently faced additional barriers to distance learning alternatives.”

A new initiative by Innovations for Learning Canada (IFLC) hopes to give local Indigenous communities the tools to fight these negative effects. The Innovations for Learning website describes the program as such, “Our specially trained Early Literacy Interventionists use our proprietary TutorMate software to provide face-to-face, 1:1, high dosage tutoring in phonics, sight word acquisition, fluency, and comprehension. This gives students in need more individualized instruction than the classroom teacher is able to provide. In a two-year, K-1 program, 78% of students taking part in our program were reading proficiently by the end of first grade.”