By Tom Momberg
The number of students recommended by their teachers and administrators for summer school in city public schools dropped to 6.2 percent of the total enrollment, leading to the lowest number of summer school students in at least five years.
The low percentage comes despite state standardized tests recommending 8.3 percent of city public school students attend summer school, according to city Department of Education figures.
The portion of students required to attend summer school dropped from 7.4 percent in 2014, and 10.1 percent in 2013.
The city DOE attributed the decreased summer school enrollment to a spring 2014 revision to the agency’s promotion policy for students in grades three through eight.
The new policy asked educators to measure whether or not students made sufficient enough progress to move on to the next grade level by reviewing their work in the classroom, rather than what used to be solely based on state standardized test scores.
Councilman Danny Dromm (D-Jackson Heights), head of the Council’s Education Committee, said he thinks the decreasing number of students mandated to take summer school is a sign of a good policy revision.
He said that because the state Education Department recently dropped Pearson Publishing as the provider of its standardized tests, there is no way to guarantee their accuracy as the sole measurement for determining whether a student is ready to move on to the next grade.
“I am glad we are starting to look at students as individuals rather than just numbers,” Dromm said during a phone interview. “Why are we going to punish kids who are improving and doing the best they can on an individual level just because they don’t meet the standards of a flawed test?”
Critics of the policy change have questioned whether the drop in summer enrollment means students are being passed without meeting the standard needed to succeed in the next grade.
Kim Sweet, executive director of Advocates for Children of New York, a nonprofit advocacy group focusing on students who are from low-income families or face discrimination in school, said struggling students could use the extra attention during summer.
“At Advocates for Children, we have had several cases where students who desperately needed to attend summer school haven’t been able to get a placement,” Sweet said in a statement. “We welcomed the change in policy that reduced reliance on test scores to determine promotion, but it didn’t change the fact that many struggling students require educational support over the summer. The need for summer school is still there despite the shift in promotion policy.”
Even though only 19,422 city students were recommended for summer school in 2015, down from over 22,500 last summer and over 32,200 in 2013, the city DOE said expanded enrichment programs will serve more than 6,000 additional students this summer.
Those programs include Summer Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics or STEM, Summer Quest and the Dream-Specialized High Schools Institute, available to eligible students.
Reach reporter Tom Momberg by e-mail at tmomb
