The goal of the Strategic Instruction Model is to create independent, successful learners–that is, students who can effectively deal with the demands of the general education curriculum. Too frequently, programs aimed at at-risk learners are only geared to helping students “just get by.” Before an instructional procedure is considered to be validated by our Center, the outcome that it produces must be found to be both statistically and socially significant. That is, the magnitude of gains must be sufficently large so as to move students who were previously receiving failing grades into the “C” range or better in standard school subjects.Central to at-risk students becoming successful learners is the consistent application of sound instructional procedures. Our data have repeatedly shown that student performance markedly changes when teachers use explicit, direct instruction when training students to master a new learning strategy. For students to successfully generalize and maintain t