Reversing the Summer Slide: A random assignment study of a summer learning program

BELL is a community-based organization that provides supplemental learning activities for low-income youth in a number of cities. BELL operates both school year and summer programs. During the summer of 2005 they had programs at five locations (three in Boston, one in New York City and one in Washington, D.C.) These programs provided five to six weeks of classes for eight hours per day and five days per week for children entering grades 1–7. This evaluation covered their summer 2005 programs in three sites--two in Boston and one in New York City.
For academic activities, students are clustered in groups of approximately 15 children with each cluster taught by 1 teacher (usually a regular teacher from the public school system) and one experienced teaching assistant (generally an Americorps volunteer or college student). Each week students receive approximately eight hours of literacy instruction (two hours per day, four days a week), four hours of math instruction (one hour a day, four days per week) and 6.5 hours of community time (0.5 hours, four days a week and a Friday 1/2 day field trip). In addition, every Friday students attend a speaker series where they hear from and ask questions of prominent citizens in their community.

2005-07-05

2005-08-12

Reading test scores

Random assignment

Computer

Family

Yes

689 families

835

About 44 percent of the sample was put in the treatment group.