![\"Campers](\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/files\/2013\/07\/DSC_0044.jpg\")
<\/a>Karelia Arauz<\/p>
Campers in the summer program at Sallye B. Mathis Elementary School learn Common Core lessons.<\/p><\/div>\n
\u201cRemember this is fourth grade\u2014they\u2019ve just finished third grade, but they\u2019re learning fourth grade curriculum,\u201d says Maxey. \u201cIt\u2019s all Common Core.\u201d<\/p>\n
This is not your traditional summer school. The kids in this classroom are part of Duval County Public Schools\u2019 Superintendent\u2019s Summer Academy<\/a>. They\u2019ll be voluntarily spending their summer here, at Sallye B., learning math and science lessons in the classroom and on field trips\u2014with the explicit goal of preventing summer learning losses.<\/p>\n\n In the three months that they\u2019re out of school, most kids lose some of what they learned in the school year. On average, students start school in the fall about a month behind where they left off in the spring. Research shows that kids from low-income, minority schools lose disproportionately more over the summer. Those losses build up and, down the road, can keep a kid from graduating<\/a>.<\/p>\n And as Florida phases in the Common Core standards during the school year, educators like Maxey are looking for ways to close that achievement gap.<\/p>\n Karelia Arauz<\/p> Researchers are watching the Duval County program to see if it can effectively prevent summer learning losses.<\/p><\/div>\n There\u2019s evidence that some not-for-profit summer programming and certain kinds of remedial summer school can prevent summer losses and even put a kid ahead of the game<\/a>. But there\u2019s a shortage of research on the effectiveness of voluntary, school-district-run programs like the one in Duval County.<\/p>\n<\/a>