Tutor-to-Teacher (T2T) Pipeline

Saga Education, 2025

Saga Education is a nationally recognized ed-tech nonprofit that offers in-school high-impact tutoring services. As the Content Marketing Manager, I designed and led the Tutor-to-Teacher storytelling initiative, a project aimed at documenting and sharing the career journeys of Saga alumni who moved from tutoring into classroom teaching.

The Assignment

Alumni data revealed that over 100 former Saga tutors had gone on to assume teaching roles in K-12 education nationwide. This pattern was not reflected in how Saga publicly presented its story. The organization's narrative centered on student outcomes, but the data pointed to a second layer of impact: Saga was also influencing the next generation of educators. My job was to highlight that story and develop content around it.

The Approach

I brought in two former tutors as summer interns to lead the interview and content development process. This was a deliberate choice. I recognized that insider voices would capture something an outside interviewer could not. Former tutors conducting interviews with fellow alumni produced conversations that were more honest, more specific, and more resonant than anything a staff member could have facilitated from the outside. We conducted six interviews and repurposed the footage into videos and audio podcasts. The project required coordination across alumni relations, branding, marketing, operations, and recruitment to expand the organizational message beyond our existing content.

The Result

The T2T initiative provided Saga with a new narrative asset that linked high-impact tutoring to the development of the teacher pipeline at both organizational and national levels. It became part of how Saga explained its broader role in promoting education equity, especially as teacher shortages grew and local schools faced increasing resource shortages.

What This Project Taught Me

This was the first time I intentionally used lived experience interviews as organizational data. I chose to focus on insider voices and regard their stories as evidence of impact rather than just content. The tutors knew things about the experience of becoming a teacher through Saga that no survey or alumni database could provide. Listening directly to those voices and allowing them to shape the narrative was the right decision to ensure an authentic narrative was discovered.