The Challenge
What is the summer slide?
The summer slide is the tendency for students to lose academic ground over the summer. This slide happens because of an opportunity gap—the inability to access enriching, constructive summertime experiences.
We offer a range of academic and healthy youth development activities free of charge over the course of our six-week summer program to bridge this opportunity gap including:
- Reading & writing practice
- STEM Aactivities
- Arts & crafts
- Dance & music lessons
- Field trips
- Confidence-building challenges like swimming + hiking
What is the Covid Slide?
The term COVID slide has been coined to describe the effects of the disruption to student’s learning caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.
School closures and the inconsistent quality of remote learning have widened existing opportunity gaps and created new ones. The latest study done by researchers at McKinsey & Company "students, on average, started school [Fall 2020] about three months behind where we would expect them to be in mathematics." As for reading, students were "a month and a half behind historical averages."
Researchers from Johns Hopkins found that “children from low-income families who were chronically absent in kindergarten also had the lowest levels of achievement in fifth grade.” In the same study, they found “chronic absence in one early grade is linked with lower test scores throughout elementary school.” COVID-related absences will undoubtedly have lasting effects for years to come.