Background: Over the past two decades, national attention has emphasized the critical role of early literacy and language instruction in preventing reading difficulties and improved our understanding of how young children learn to read. The research has established that students who are not strong readers by Grade 3 are less likely to build vocabulary and interact with a wide variety of texts. A recent study by Jacob et al. demonstrated the impact of a volunteer tutoring program on Grade 2 students' reading comprehension skills. Despite these findings, few supplemental early literacy tutoring programs have conducted efficacy trials to demonstrate their potential impact on early literacy, comprehension, and language skills. Literacy First has invested in rigorous research to evaluate program impacts by implementing regression discontinuity design studies over the past 3 years, using students' beginning-of-the-year reading ability to determine program eligibility. Findings from an RDD provide strong evidence that Literacy First significantly accelerated students' reading skills across Grades K-2 in two Austin-area school districts and charter schools. In addition, a quasi-experimental study, investigating the impact of Literacy First on students' reading skills found that Grade and 2 students who graduated from Literacy First scored statistically significantly higher than matched comparison students on the Development Reading Assessment. However, there are limitations to this research base: None of the studies used an experimental design, and the RDD and propensity score matching studies have the potential for sampling and selection bias. Objective: The authors received funding from the Arnold Foundation to conduct an independent evaluation of the impact of the Literacy First program on Grade 2 student outcomes. The study has two primary aims: (1) to estimate the impact of Literacy First on Grade 2 students' short-term reading fluency and comprehension skills and (2) to estimate the impact of Literacy First on Grade 2 students' long-term outcomes as measured by the Grade 3-5 State of STAAR reading and mathematics assessments. Setting: The study was conducted within 22 elementary schools in the Austin Independent School District in Texas. Participants: The study was conducted with two cohorts of Grade 2 students from the 2017-18 and 2018-19 school years. Eligibility for participation in Literacy First tutoring was determined by parental consent and students' scores on the screening assessment. All students whose parents did not opt them out of the study and who scored at the Tier 2 level on the assessment were eligible to receive Literacy First services. Intervention: Literacy First is an AmeriCorps program that provides trained tutors for students in kindergarten through Grade 2 in the Austin area. Literacy First's early literacy tutoring program is designed to strengthen students' early reading and comprehension through daily, 30-minute tutoring sessions. The program tracks student data, including benchmark assessments, weekly progress monitoring, attendance, and demographics, as well as program fidelity of implementation data from tutors. Fifty percent of Literacy First's tutors are bilingual, allowing the program to provide support to both Spanish- and English-speaking students. The program identifies students reading below grade level each fall and provides tutoring across the school year. Research Design: The evaluation employed a multi-site randomized controlled trial to estimate the impact of Literacy First on Grade 2 students' reading outcomes. Grade 2 students were randomly assigned, within each school, to one of two groups: (1) a treatment group that received Literacy First tutoring and (2) a control group that conducted "business-as-usual." Students in the control condition did not receive Literacy First tutoring but were eligible for other types of assistance typically available to students in the participating schools (e.g., literacy coach support). Data Collection and Analysis: The study used extant administrative data from AISD, as well as primary data collected from students participating in the study. The administrative data from AISD consisted of student background characteristics and Grade 3 and 4 STAAR Reading and Mathematics assessment data. Grade 2 oral reading fluency data were collected by Literacy First staff, and Grade 2 reading comprehension data were collected by AIR staff. Students either completed the English or Spanish versions of the assessments depending on their English proficiency level. Grade 2 oral fluency was assessed using Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills Oral Reading Fluency or Indicadores Dinámicos del Éxito en la Lectura (IDEL) Fludidez en Relato Oral, while Grade 2 reading comprehension was assessed using the Grade 2 ITBS reading comprehension subtest or the Grade 2 Logramos reading comprehension subtest. In Grades 3 and 4, students completed either the English or Spanish version of the Grade 3 STAAR reading and mathematics assessments. English and Spanish versions of all assessments covered the same content and skills; however, the assessments are not direct translations of each other, are not on the same scales, and are not considered equivalent. Preliminary Findings (Optional): Results of the analyses showed statistically significant effects of Literacy First on students' Grade 2 oral fluency and reading comprehension. Literacy First students tutoring scored about 0.33 and 0.19 standard deviations, respectively than higher than non-Literacy First students in these sites (p<0.01). However, while analyses did not show statistically significant effects of Literacy First on students' Grade 3 STAAR reading scores, Literacy First students scored about 0.09 standard deviations higher than non-Literacy First students in these sites (p>0.05). This analysis was underpowered because Grade 3 STAAR assessments were not available for cohort 2 students, due to COVID-19. In our presentation, we will also present preliminary findings from our analyses focused on students' Grade 4 (Cohort 1) and 5 (Cohort 2) STAAR reading and mathematics assessment scores. These analyses will allow us to assess whether students who received Literacy First tutoring are weathering the COVID-19 learning conditions better than students who did not receive Literacy First tutoring.