From Classroom Drudgery to Joyful Enrichment: The Evolution of Summer School
The pandemic supercharged summer school鈥檚 transformation from remedial academics to learning plus fun 鈥� and now there鈥檚 no going back, experts say.
On a sweltering Wednesday morning in July, a group of second graders gathered around their desks to inspect and prod at soil and plant vegetable seeds.
Their teacher engaged them in a call and response: 鈥淵ou can poke it!鈥� she says. 鈥淵ou can?鈥�
鈥淧oke it!鈥� they responded in unison before she added, 鈥渁nd take a little bit of dirt out!鈥�
Down the hall, in a kindergarten classroom, kids spent the morning working on math problems before moving into a purposeful play session focused on fossils.
鈥淚鈥檓 working on three plus three equals six 鈥� using blocks!鈥� exclaimed one student, Gabriella, who shared that her favorite parts of the day are 鈥渟nack and recess and lunch.鈥�
Later that afternoon, she and her classmates headed to one of a number of extracurricular activities ranging from martial arts to step dance and soccer.
These students at New Bridges Elementary, a school which sits along a stretch of the Eastern Parkway in the heart of Brooklyn鈥檚 Crown Heights neighborhood, were participating in a partnership between New York City Public Schools and the Department of Youth and Community Development. The program, launched in 2021 in the depths of the pandemic, gives students access to free academic and enrichment programming over the course of six summer weeks 鈥� a time when schools have historically been shuttered to all students except those in need of the most concentrated, remedial academic support.
New York City is one of scores of districts across the nation who have worked to transform traditional summer school into a more inclusive, enrichment-filled yet still academically rigorous space.
Some of these districts began this shift over a decade ago, following the release of a which put forth a case for rebuilding summer learning and highlighted the ways in which this time could be used to fight some of the academic backslide typically seen between June and September, especially for students from low-income backgrounds.
These efforts were supercharged during the pandemic, when schools were faced with a learning loss crisis and, simultaneously, a seismic funding influx from the $189.5 billion Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund, also known as ESSER.
The pandemic, 鈥渞eally lit a fire in everybody to say, 鈥榃e can’t do things the same,鈥欌�� said Nancy Gannon, senior advisor of Teaching and Learning for U.S. Education at , a nonprofit which built the to help districts and states rethink what can be accomplished during these down months.
鈥淚 don鈥檛 think people really dug into the potential of summer until these last couple years,鈥� she added. 鈥淎nd now that they see how potent it can be. I don’t know that there’ll be any going back.鈥�
But some districts and states are scrambling to hold onto this new vision of summer with ESSER money sunsetting, the recent freeze 鈥� then release 鈥� of the federal dollars that keep many of these programs afloat and a greater uncertainty about the very future of the U.S. Department of Education and all its funding streams.
‘It can be a joyful place’
Kevyn Bowles, the principal of New Bridges Elementary, said he鈥檚 witnessed the transformation of summer first hand over the course of his 12 years running the school.
Historically, you were 鈥渂ringing together the students who had done the most poorly over the course of the school year in eight different schools, and putting them all in a class together,鈥� he said. 鈥淪o even if you were bringing your most joyful teaching self to it, it still just was a challenging situation.鈥�
Kids didn鈥檛 want to be there, he added, and it showed. That changed with the introduction of Summer Rising in 2021.
鈥淓ven from that first summer, it felt more like an opportunity for students,鈥� Bowles said, 鈥渧ersus something that we were forcing just a small number of kids [to do] because they had quote, unquote, failed. 鈥� We had enormous demand鈥�
This summer, around 250 elementary school students have signed up to attend Summer Rising at Bowles鈥� school, and fewer than 30 of them are mandated to be there.
Each morning, the kids gather in the auditorium at 8 a.m. for Bright Start, a five-minute morning meeting filled with songs, affirmations and high fives.
鈥淭o me that just sets the tone,鈥� said Bowles, 鈥渓ike we’re here together. We’re in this together. It can be a joyful place. It can be a fun day.鈥�
Kids next head to a half-hour block of social-emotional learning through yoga and mindfulness, followed by three-and-a-half hours of concentrated academics, taught by licensed teachers. After lunch and recess, students have their afternoon 鈥渟pecials鈥� 鈥� including soccer, martial arts, theater and dance 鈥� which wrap up by 6 p.m. each evening.
Bowles said the vast range of enrichment activities they鈥檙e uniquely able to offer students over the summer bring a lot of happiness and motivation to the school building. And while attendance in July and August remains a challenge, New Bridges Elementary has seen positive results in math and reading, especially for the youngest students: Kindergarteners through second graders who attended Summer Rising in past years either maintained their skills or grew, whereas their peers who didn鈥檛, slid slightly backwards.
鈥淪ummer learning arguably has the greatest impact at the lowest price on the greatest number of students of any policy solutions,鈥� Chris Smith, executive director of , told 社区黑料. 鈥淎nd it鈥檚 time that we invest in it in a serious way with public funding.鈥�
鈥楢 blank canvas鈥�
For summer learning to be an effective tool to combat learning loss 鈥� rather than merely functioning as child care or summer camp 鈥� school leaders need to strategically implement research-backed best practices, experts and researchers told 社区黑料.
From 2011-16 a group of RAND researchers , free and district-led summer learning programs for low-income elementary students in five urban school districts: Boston, Dallas, Pittsburgh, Duval County, Florida and Rochester, New York.
They found it was important to pair strong teachers with rigorous academic curriculum and high-quality enrichment experiences. Other recommendations include:
- Programs should run for five to six weeks with three to four hours a day of concentrated academics, including 90 or more minutes of math and 120 or more minutes of English Language Arts.
- Small class sizes, capped at 15 students per adult
- A clear attendance policy and incentives for showing up
- Recruitment and hiring of the district鈥檚 most highly effective teachers
- Curriculum anchored in school-year standards and student needs
- Early planning led by a program director who dedicates at least half of their time to this work, beginning in January
After two consecutive summers, students who attended one of these programs for 20 or more days outperformed their peers in math and ELA and displayed stronger social-emotional competencies, the Rand researchers found.
The pandemic provided a perfect opportunity for districts across the country to implement some of these practices, both because students had a heightened need of academic and social-emotional support and because of the unprecedented sum of federal rescue funds that were poured into schools. One-fifth was allocated to with 1% specifically earmarked for summer learning.
Because the money was distributed through states 鈥� rather than districts 鈥� this also invited them into the conversation, when historically summer programming had been locally driven by schools or other organizations. And this unique moment provided fertile ground for more research, according to Allison Crean Davis, the chief research officer at , who also directed a three-part funded by the Wallace Foundation.
鈥淣ever had we seen this natural experiment where it’s like, 鈥榃e’re going to give 1% of these large funds to states to then tee up summer learning 鈥� all across the country [and] give some of that money to districts to actually do it,鈥欌�� she said. 鈥淪o it just felt like it would be a real missed opportunity not to say, 鈥榃hat does this end up looking like? How do states respond?鈥欌��
She and her team found that 94% of the local education agencies they studied offered some kind of summer programming in 2021. Of those that did, all implemented academic programming, 59% were traditional 鈥渃redit recovery鈥� programs aimed at students who had failed and 57% supplemented academic programs with social-emotional learning.
RAND also expanded on its earlier during the pandemic and found that 81% of schools nationwide offered summer programs in 2023, yet districts鈥� largest summer programs typically enrolled less than half of eligible students and less than 1 in 5 of the largest elementary programs met the minimum recommended hours of academic instruction.
Despite some of these ongoing trials and errors, summer remains an exciting space for innovation and collaboration, said Julie Fitz, a researcher at the .
鈥淪ummer is just an interesting space where you have a little bit of a blank canvas, and states were getting really creative with thinking about how to design that space,鈥� she said.
It also became an area of rare bipartisanship, she added. 鈥淚t鈥檚 just been so refreshing to see people coming together around kids and putting the needs of kids and families first.鈥�
鈥楲ittle shy about investing in summer right now鈥�
This is the first summer since the pandemic that most states are navigating summer school without COVID relief funds 鈥� and with increased uncertainty about federal education spending more broadly.
While the hope initially was that districts and states would find ways to sustain programming after that fiscal cliff, many remain concerned that even basic “foundational funding” needed to educate students might disappear, Davis said.
鈥淚t wouldn鈥檛 surprise me if people are a little shy about investing in summer right now,鈥� she said.
This tension became especially apparent on June 30, when the Trump administration announced it would withhold almost $7 billion in previously allocated money, including $1.3 billion for the , which districts rely on to run afterschool and summer programming. The news came one day before schools were meant to receive the money.
鈥淭his type of uncertainty 鈥� where they thought they were going to have it, and then all of the sudden we’re told the day before they expected to be given it, to no longer have it 鈥� is unprecedented,鈥� said Tara Thomas, government affairs manager at
The move disproportionately harmed smaller districts and those serving larger populations of students from low-income families, 鈥渂ecause they didn’t have money to float these services while they wait to figure out if the federal government is going to give them the money that they were promised,鈥� Thomas said.
Following widespread, bipartisan pushback, the Office of Management and Budget said on July 18 that the $1.3 billion for afterschool and summer programs, although filed by two dozen states after the sudden freeze alleged critical academic and extracurricular programs had already been “irreparably harmed.”
Despite these hurdles, researchers and district leaders remain excited about where summer learning is headed.
鈥淚 think it鈥檚 really encouraging and there鈥檚 a lot of vision about how summer can be an important tool in the state toolbox in terms of improving educational outcomes and other social focus areas,鈥� said the Learning Policy Institute鈥檚 Fitz. 鈥淚 think it鈥檚 really an optimistic area right now.鈥�
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