Consortium on Chicago School Research
Melissa Roderick, Mimi Engel and Jenny Nagaoka
February 2003
This report takes a comprehensive look at the Chicago Public Schools' Summer Bridge program, which provides summer instruction to third, sixth and eighth graders who fail to achieve the test scores necessary to advance to the next grade. The program is mandatory for such students and current serves about 21,000 of them annually. It's become a key component of the district's effort to end social promotion. This study concludes that the program basically works: students' test scores do improve, helping many to pass to the next grade. And gains aren't confined to those closest to the test cutoff; in some cases, the lowest scoring students posted large gains. Further, students claim to enjoy the program more than the regular school year, and attendance--typically quite low in summer schools--often exceeds 90 percent. However, the authors also find that Summer Bridge "does not change students' experiences during the school year." Instead, students generally return to their previous learning rates, with some modest improvements. And unfortunately, this report makes only a half-hearted attempt to measure the program's cost, so whether it's a better investment than other interventions remains an open question. Still, the report provides great detail about Summer Bridge's distinguishing features (notably small classes and a centralized curriculum) and cites much other research on summer schools. You can find your own copy on-line at http://www.consortium-chicago.org/publications/p59.html.
