In 2019, the Texas legislature passed a historic education finance bill that included an initiative to add up to 30 days to the school-year calendar. One way districts can do this is to offer a voluntary summer learning program. In 2020, the American Institutes for Research, with support from The Wallace Foundation, launched the six-year Texas…

This report examines the implementation of Summer 305, an enhanced summer program which operated from June 24 through July 26 during the summer of 2024 at 103 sites in Miami-Dade County Public Schools. Twenty-two program offerings were provided to accelerate learning recovery, develop foundational skills, and address social and emotional needs.…

Intentionally designed afterschool and summer programs can benefit students' social-emotional skills, accelerate their learning, and even increase their school attendance during the school year. This infographic touches on the value of these programs, possible barriers that might limit access to students, and states with innovative models.

Districts and states are targeting summer break -- the most substantial chunk of out-of-school time in the typical year -- as a prime opportunity to help students make progress with learning left unfinished due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Federal COVID relief funds will allow schools the freedom to offer programs as they never have before. But not…

The 21st Century Community Learning Centers (21st CCLC) program, funded through the U.S. Department of Education, provides academic enrichment opportunities outside of the regular school day to help students meet state and local performance standards in core academic subjects, such as reading and math. This report summarizes the 2019-2020…

This brief is one in a series aimed at providing K-12 education decision-makers and advocates with an evidence base to ground discussions about how to best serve students during and following the novel coronavirus pandemic. It begins with an at-a-glance view of an effective voluntary academic summer learning program structure (duration, class…

The evidence that student learning declines sharply (or stagnates) during the summer has motivated a substantial interest in programs that provide intensive academic instruction during the summer. However, the existing literature suggests that such programs, which typically focus on just one or two subjects, have modest effects on students'…

Many talented students in under-resourced schools do not reach their full potential. Research shows that by sixth grade, children born into poverty have likely spent 6,000 fewer hours learning than their middle-class counterparts. Higher Achievement, an intensive summer and after-school program, aims to close that learning gap. It offers…

The Department for Education (DfE) provided funding for secondary schools to establish short face-to-face summer schools over the 2021 summer holiday, to help them make up for learning lost during the COVID-19 pandemic. Lasting for one or two weeks, summer schools involved a blend of academic learning and enrichment activities and were intended to…

This appendix provides additional details on the underlying data, statistical models, and results presented in "The Big Lift Descriptive Analyses: Progress across Three Kindergarten Classes." First the authors describe how they created each control and outcome variable and its source (e.g., parent report), followed by an overview of the…

The 21st Century Community Learning Centers (21st CCLC) grant program provides academic enrichment opportunities outside of the regular school day to help students meet state and local performance standards in core academic subjects. This report summarizes the results of the Center for Research in Educational Policy's evaluation of the 2017-2018…

The Big Lift™ (Big Lift), a collective impact initiative extending from preschool through third grade in San Mateo County, California, aims to boost reading proficiency and kindergarten readiness through four programmatic pillars: High-Quality Preschool, Summer Learning, Attendance, and Family Engagement. In this report, the authors present…

This exploratory investigation examined the transformation of a traditional summer reading intervention (SRI) to synchronous virtual format in response to school closures due to COVID-19. Goals were to adapt and describe the adaptation of the in-person intervention to the virtual environment, examine program outcomes, and understand tutor and…

The Big Lift™ (Big Lift) is a preschool-third-grade collective impact initiative in San Mateo County, California. The initiative is a partnership of the County of San Mateo, the San Mateo County Office of Education, and the Silicon Valley Community Foundation. Launched in 2012, the initiative aims to boost children's reading proficiency by third…

The Big Lift™ (Big Lift) is a preschool-third-grade collective impact initiative in San Mateo County, California. The initiative is a partnership of the County of San Mateo, the San Mateo County Office of Education, and the Silicon Valley Community Foundation. Launched in 2012, the initiative aims to boost children's reading proficiency by third…