A key provision of the 2002 No Child Left Behind law–its mandate that struggling schools offer low-income students free after-school tutoring–has gone almost completely unmonitored, a study released by the Center on Education Policy finds.

Private tutoring companies have jumped to take advantage of the law's "supplemental education services," or SES, provision, which divvies up a pot each year estimated to be as large as $2.5 billion. But though companies produce rosy reports, very few states and districts have any idea whether the tutoring is actually helping students learn. More than two thirds of states told CEP they have a tough time monitoring SES programs for quality and effectiveness, and three said they are "not at all" able to monitor them.

The flowing federal money paired with very little oversight is "a recipe for disaster," says Jack Jennings, CEP's president."You have people's tax dollars that are going out the door, and nobody knows how much is going out the door, and nobody knows whether it's resulting in any good," Jennings says.

Elizabeth Weiss Green, U.S. News and World Report, March 15.