Madison teachers who participate in the Schools of Hope tutoring program were recognized Tuesday for their role in narrowing the racial achievement gap among students over the last 10 years.

"That's what school districts around the country are trying to do, and Madison is accomplishing it," first lady Jessica Doyle told more than 50 elementary school teachers treated to the first outdoor reception of the season at the Governor's Mansion on National Teacher Appreciation Day.

"Because of you and that extra energy you put in," Doyle said, "more students can succeed and this whole community can be living with hope."

Schools of Hope began in 1995 as a civic journalism project involving the Wisconsin State Journal and WISC-TV. Since then, the percentage of black third-grade students reading at below-standard levels has dropped from 28.5 percent to 5.1 percent in 2004, the last year for which comparable figures are available due to changes in student testing, said Tom Kuplic, spokesman for the United Way of Dane County, which leads the program.

In 1998, Schools of Hope began putting volunteers trained as tutors in classrooms to work one-on-one with students in conjunction with teachers and their curriculums. For the past decade, about 600 tutors have worked with 300 teachers each year.

United Way President Leslie Ann Howard said that before then, "the tons of tutoring going on in the community ... wasn't eliminating the gap."

"The teachers, they were really the key," Howard said, adding that the one-one relationship between tutors and students also is needed.

Jamie Kron, a kindergarten teacher at Chavez Elementary School, said her students, many of whom have never been exposed to reading or math before, "come in just wanting that one-on-one attention."

"The big thing is having kids connect to school," said Michael Deignan, principal of Sandburg Elementary School, adding that the care that comes along with the one-on-one tutoring makes students "feel someone cares about them and makes a difference."

In addition to thanking teachers for welcoming tutors into their classrooms and helping to train them, the United Way also wants to reaffirm the Schools of Hope research-supported model of having trained tutors work one-on-one with students in conjunction with teachers — and not have the tutors doing other volunteer work in the classroom, said Deedra Atkinson, senior vice president.

"We know that if the Schools of Hope model is followed, we get results," Howard said.

"We really want to reinvigorate Schools of Hope going forward," she said, and "make sure we get the same results for the next decade as this one."