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Pulling back the curtains on wage-theft enforcement in MN; Trump's latest attack is on RFK, Jr; NM LGBTQ+ equality group endorses 2024 'Rock Star' candidates; Michigan's youth justice reforms: Expanded diversion, no fees.

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Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg says rebuilding Baltimore's Key Bridge will be challenging and expensive. An Alabama Democrat flips a state legislature seat and former Connecticut senator Joe Lieberman dies at 82.

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Historic wildfires could create housing and health issues for rural Texans, a Kentucky program helps prison parolees start a new life, and descendants of Nicodemus, Kansas celebrate the Black settlers who journeyed across the 1870s plains seeking self-governance.

“Smarter Summer” for Hundreds of Massachusetts Middle Schoolers

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Thursday, July 21, 2011   

BOSTON - It's not the summer school of yesteryear. It's more like a swanky private camp.

Thousands of low- to middle-income students in Boston and Springfield have been attending a Smarter Summers program designed to stop learning loss and provide fun at the same time with elective studies, music and field trips.

The focus, says Sarah Pitcock, director of the Smarter Summers Project at the National Summer Learning Association , is on children entering grades 6 through 9, a time she calls a unique window for learning opportunities.

"The habits and attitudes and abilities that young people have by ninth grade are highly indicative of the success that they'll have in college and careers."

Extensive research shows that unequal summer learning opportunities play a key role in the achievement gap between low- and middle-income children and those in families who can afford private programs, Pitcock says.

Dean Bradley works with BELL (Building Educated Leaders for Life), a Boston-based nonprofit which is running summer learning programs in the two Massachusetts cities.

"There's a great science program under way in the Springfield sites, and in Boston we have a variety of partners that we work with. One of my favorites is Tenacity, which is teaching the children how to play tennis."

Classes in the Smarter Summers programs are also much smaller than those in the regular school year, Pitcock says, and each class has two teachers.

"We're hoping that we're going to not only stem that summer learning loss and stop it, but we're going to actually accelerate learning so that they get into the best high schools (and) know the opportunities that exist for them in college."

Smarter Summers programs are being run in a number of cities with a grant from the Walmart Foundation which provides more than 20,000 slots in high-quality summer learning programs.

Details about summer learning loss and tips for prevention are online at SmarterSummers.org.



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