Florida, North Carolina, Delaware, California and Washington are only a few of the states that are struggling with their school budgets this year. These districts are trying to find ways to make things work and one of them is cutting the summer school programs. The federal stimulus law is giving $100 billion dollars to public education and many educational leaders are urging schools to use that money to keep schools open in the summer. Not all school districts are in the “hurt bag.” Some schools are using the stimulus money to fund full-day summer school at the low performing schools. During these days the kids do math and reading but also are exposed to science, gym, and outdoor activities. When school districts are looking to cut programs many districts see summer school as a “frill.” Let’s hope this budget cut does not come to haunt these districts when they see their assessment results in the fall.After reading this article I was very surprised to see that some districts have to cut programs completely. Currently, I am teaching summer school at a school that has a program that is not necessarily for low achieving students but anyone who is interested in maintaining skills over the summer. In the past, this program has been very fun and hands on as far as learning. Teachers now say they are disgusted because it is getting to be more paper and pencil. This year our school district took some of the federal stimulus money and bought an actual summer school reading curriculum for us to use. It is a very nice program but I also feel that it is a little too intense for summer school. The kids have been really great about it and have not complained. The feeling from our district was that they wanted to see test scores improve and to do that they wanted to see if the kids who were in summer school will improve more than the kids who were not exposed to this reading curriculum. Personally, I think that by cutting programs completely you are opening up a new can of worms. Many students who would normally come to summer school will receive little if any education this summer and regression will take place. I hope I am wrong but I think the answer here is to cut back time or funds instead of cutting completely.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/02/education/02school.html?_r=1&ref=education
