Summer Program Reduces the Academic Achievement Gap for Low-Income Baltimore Students

FORUM

When: Wednesday, February 4, 2004; 9:00 a.m. - 10:30 a.m.

Where: Open Society Institute-Baltimore
201 North Charles Street, Suite 1300, Baltimore, Maryland

BALTIMORE—Educators, researchers, and leaders of community-based organizations will discuss Baltimore's model summer learning programs at an Open Society Institute-Baltimore forum this Wednesday from 9:00 am to 10:30 am. The forum will highlight lessons learned from the Summer Model Partnership, a joint initiative between Baltimore's After School Strategy, Baltimore City Public Schools and the Johns Hopkins University Center for Summer Learning.

The Partnership brings together the Baltimore City Public Schools and youth development organizations to provide comprehensive summer educational programs for Baltimore youth that help combat summer learning loss, a major problem for children across the country and in Baltimore. The average American student looses 2.6 months of math skills over the summer. This loss exacerbates the achievement gap between higher- and lower-income students, as higher-income students tend to gain proficiency in some skills such as reading over the summer, while lower-income students lose proficiency.

However, preliminary findings from a randomized, three-year longitudinal study of the Teach Baltimore Summer Academy program, part of the Summer Model Partnership, suggest that a multi-year summer intervention can counteract the cumulative effect of summer loss on low-income students' reading outcomes. And, while this initiative focuses primarily on summer learning, the model also shows the value and importance of enriching the development of children year round.

Panelists will focus on ways that schools and community-based programs can work together to expand the provision of educational opportunities.

"With a relatively small investment we can get people working together and produce significant results," said Ron Fairchild, executive director of the Center for Summer Learning at Johns Hopkins University. "This is real model of what public schools and non-profit organizations can do when they unite around a goal."

Fairchild is just one of Wednesday's panel participants. Others include:

• Bradley Alston , operations director, YMCA of Central Maryland;
• Erin Coleman, after school strategist, Safe and Sound Campaign;
• Laura D'Ana, principal, Patterson High School; and
• Roslyn Johnson, associate director, Department of Recreation and Parks.

Sixty-five advocates, educators, and Baltimore City School administrators are expected to attend the forum. Speakers and school district officials will stay afterward to continue the dialogue about best practices for summer educational models.

"OSI strongly supports innovative summer programs like the Summer Model Partnership," said Jane Sundius, OSI-Baltimore's education and youth development program officer. "Partnerships between schools and community-based organizations that expand summer learning opportunities can help to close the achievement gap that is holding Baltimore's students back."

The forum is sponsored jointly by OSI-Baltimore and Baltimore's After School Strategy.

The Open Society Institute is a private operating and grantmaking foundation that promotes the development of open society around the world. OSI's U.S. Programs seek to strengthen democracy in the United States by addressing barriers to opportunity and justice, broadening public discussion about such barriers, and assisting marginalized groups to participate equally in civil society and to make their voices heard. U.S. Programs challenge over-reliance on the market by advocating appropriate government responsibility for human needs and promoting public interest and service values in law, medicine, and the media. OSI's U.S. Programs support initiatives in a range of areas, including access to justice for low and moderate income people; independence of the judiciary; ending the death penalty; reducing gun violence and over-reliance on incarceration; drug policy reform; urban education and youth programs; fair treatment of immigrants; reproductive health and choice; campaign finance reform; and improved care of the dying. OSI is part of the network of foundations, created and funded by George Soros, active in more than 50 countries around the world.