U-46 revamps summer school for better results

Summer school traditionally has been the go-to method of stymieing brain drain in students.

Yet, educators at the state's second-largest school district are realizing its effects are not long lasting.

When comparing reading levels of students who took summer school versus their peers who didn't, officials at Elgin Area School District U-46 found little evidence of improvement.

"If we saw an initial bump after summer school, it quickly faded at the end of the year," said Trisha Shrode, U-46 director of curriculum and instruction. "We just did not see this huge return. For the cost, we weren't really seeing this huge uptick in student scores in reading."

U-46's six-week remedial sessions held at district sites cost roughly $500,000, not factoring in building use and utilities. Officials decided to revamp the program this year.

The district kicked off a new Summer Reading Challenge Camp Thursday in partnership with Gail Borden, Poplar Creek and Bartlett public libraries busing 1,044 students from kindergarten through sixth grade from 41 school sites. At the libraries, 25 U-46 teachers will engage students in hands-on literacy activities and help them create summer reading selections and checkout books to take home.

The camp will be offered Monday through Friday at Gail Borden and Poplar Creek with a group of roughly 50 students from each school visiting once a week. At Bartlett, only eight days of camp activities are planned. Each session will last between 60 and 90 minutes. There is no cost to U-46 for using the library space, and busing students there also will be less expensive, officials said.

The program isn't just for students who are struggling with reading, Shrode said.

"We asked schools to identify kids who would benefit the most from the program ... kids who need to stay in that pattern of connecting with adults so that it's not such a shock coming back in the fall," she said. "We want kids to be reading during the summer and we already have these amazing programs going on at the library."

Part of the goal is exposing students to library resources and promoting them as additional sites of learning.

At Gail Borden, which serves 23 U-46 schools, students will engage in 45 minutes of hands-on STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) exploration activities tied in with the library's space exhibit.

"It's like a field trip and enrichment program," said Jennifer Bueche, director of the library's KidSpace program, which helps students identify books to read. "It's exciting that some of the kids that may be coming may have never been here before. In one day, we could see 200 U-46 students through this program and that's on top of any families that come. We are hoping they translate their camp experience into a lifelong library using experience."

Library officials expect the partnership with U-46 will grow and hope it will result in more library users.

"We've tripled the number of kids that have finished the summer reading program," said Denise Raleigh, Gail Borden spokeswoman. "We know that our role is to support these kids educationally, recreationally, and creatively. This is taking it to a new level."

Whether the program will continue next summer will depend on feedback from participants and the libraries.

"It still takes a lot of man hours, time and effort and cost," Shrode said. "If it is not getting us where we want to be, is there a better way to spend this money to impact student learning?"