North Dakota educators and outside experts concur that the two top priorities for doubling student performance here are increased tutoring opportunities for struggling kids and more professional development for their teachers.

The plan, still in a very preliminary stage, calls for having 400 tutors and 350 counselors for at-risk kids across the state, as well as additional professional opportunities and training for teachers.

This idea emerged out of a series of meetings this week in the state Capitol. On Wednesday, consultants who are working with the state to draw up an increased student performance plan met with teachers, superintendents and business leaders from across the state. On Thursday, they reported their results to the Commission on Education Improvement, a body tasked with finding a way to improve statewide education achievement.

Led by Lt. Gov. Jack Dalrymple, the commission is in the early stages of an effort that will result in detailed recommendations next fall and a bill draft leading into the 2009 legislative session. It is the same process followed by the panel to head off school districts' lawsuits by tearing up and rewriting the state's education aid formula leading up the 2007 legislative session.

Allan Odden, a University of Wisconsin-Madison professor who's working as a consultant to the commission, said his recommendations are based on what has been done in other states that successfully doubled their student performance.

Odden said the teachers he met with this week were largely on-board with the plan and gave him some good recommendations on the details. For example, teachers wanted increased electives for students and a guarantee that there would be at least one tutor in each school.

Dalrymple said the state can learn from others' success stories, even though it has the unique challenge of a widespread system of small rural schools.

"We're gaining from a tremendous amount of research from across the nation," he said.

Many important details are yet to be worked out. For example, there was widespread agreement at Thursday's meeting that there should be more teacher training and greater opportunities for teachers to work together. But just how should that be achieved?

Ideas included after-school training sessions, intense summer training sessions, and a program where teachers teach the same units at the same time and then collaborate to improve their teaching results.

The commission also will be facing the challenge of figuring out how to implement these ideas, especially given that they require additional resources.

Dalrymple said it might require an approach of phasing-in the assets until recommended levels are reached at some future target date.

Rep. RaeAnn Kelsch, a Mandan Republican who's also a commission member and chairman of the House Education Committee, said the effort comes at an important time when North Dakota's test scores are stagnant in the face of rising scores by students in other states.

"I think it's necessary and I think it could work," she said.

(Reach reporter Jonathan Rivoli at 223-8482 or jonathan.rivoli@bismarcktribune.com.)