The excellent news: Most superintendents plan to maintain or broaden their districts’ spending on summer time college packages in 2025, an effort that might assist many college students construct on educational abilities discovered throughout the college yr.
The unhealthy information: Districts must discover new methods to fund these packages because the federal pandemic aid support they used lately to begin new summer time choices or broaden current ones are now not flowing, which means they’ll doubtless want to drag from their district budgets or search grants.
These are two key takeaways from the outcomes of a brand new nationwide survey of superintendents by AASA, The Faculty Superintendents Affiliation, Gallup, and the Nationwide Summer season Studying Affiliation. The outcomes come at a time when districts are compelled to make robust choices about which packages to maintain, minimize, or reduce with much less funding accessible. However they counsel that superintendents are dedicated to summer time programming, and imagine within the educational and social advantages they convey.
Virtually two-thirds of the 421 superintendents who participated within the survey reported utilizing pandemic aid funding on summer time packages between the 2021-22 and 2024-25 college years.
Many superintendents mentioned they’d depend on a mixture of funding sources to maintain these new and expanded packages working. Eighty-one p.c of superintendents mentioned they plan to make use of cash from district budgets; 52 p.c mentioned they’d use grants, in accordance with the survey, which was performed from November to January.
The survey additionally confirmed the sorts of packages districts provide in the summertime, superintendents’ views on whether or not there may be ample summer time programming of their areas, what district leaders see as the highest advantages of summer time studying, and the way they measure success for his or her packages.
Right here’s what the report discovered, in charts.
By and enormous, districts plan to keep up their summer time choices in 2025
Typically, demand has been strong.
About 58 p.c of superintendents mentioned their summer time packages had been at capability in 2024, and one other 5 p.c mentioned they had been over capability. The remainder (37 p.c) mentioned their packages had been under-enrolled. About three-quarters of superintendents mentioned the most important barrier to scholar participation was conflicts with mother and father’ work schedules.
There are some variations by district measurement within the sorts of summer time programming provided, with bigger districts—these with 1,000 or extra college students—extra prone to provide summer time programming in any respect.
Most superintendents mentioned their districts provided summer time studying packages for remediation (73 p.c) and for college students with disabilities (55 p.c) final summer time. A a lot smaller proportion provided broader packages like summer time college for all college students (27 p.c) and enrichment for high-performing college students (24 p.c).
Superintendents usually indicated they deliberate to supply the identical sorts of summer time packages this yr as they did final yr.
Larger-income districts usually tend to have ample summer time programming from exterior organizations
Responses didn’t embody details about what different programming is likely to be provided regionally by different organizations and firms, apart from the college district, AASA leaders famous. However the survey captured superintendents’ views on whether or not there’s ample summer time programming of their communities.
These packages might—and may—work with the college district to make sure the choices are strong and at the least considerably aligned with the district’s targets and classes, mentioned Bryan Joffe, the director of youngsters’s packages at AASA.
That alignment is necessary, as 91 p.c of superintendents say summer time packages are both crucial or necessary to “reaching strategic targets” of their district. These targets differ, Joffe mentioned, however usually need to do with getting ready college students for school, careers, and life after highschool, akin to boosting highschool commencement charges.
When requested whether or not there are ample summer time studying packages for college students of their district, superintendents had been divided primarily based partially on the median family earnings of their district. Superintendents in lower- and middle-income districts (the place the median family earnings is lower than $81,000) are much less doubtless than their friends in higher-income districts to imagine ample summer time studying alternatives can be found to their college students.
Superintendents say summer time packages ship necessary advantages to college students
Research have proven that summer time packages are efficient instruments to enhance educational outcomes—however that college students have to indicate up for the packages to work, posing a problem for districts to design a summer time program that can draw college students. Much more analysis has proven usually that the extra time college students spend studying and interesting with educational ideas, the higher.
About 73 p.c of superintendents primarily view summer time college as a method for college students to keep up and enhance educational abilities, as opposed as mainly a social alternative, the survey discovered. (However enjoyable is one necessary profit, in accordance with superintendents.)
District leaders mentioned they decide their summer time packages’ success primarily based on taking part college students’ studying and math scores (33 p.c), college students’ basic educational efficiency initially of the following educational yr (25 p.c), and enrollment in this system (25 p.c).
