Program lets freshmen get early start on school year

Officials worry struggling students won’t take advantage of free summer session

Even though the free program will include transportation and lunch, officials are worried many of the 2,200 county students eligible this summer will not show up for the voluntary program.

‘‘Many of our parents are struggling; they don’t have child care,” said school board member Linda Thornton Thomas (Dist. 4). ‘‘A lot of time the older kids are at home with brothers and sisters. It’s just very hard.”

Students’ success in the ninth grade could have an impact on whether they remain in school, experts said.

‘‘What we find from the data that’s out there [is] if you can get a kid through to 10th grade, they’re going to graduate,” said C. Jay Hertzog, dean of the College of Education at Slippery Rock University in Pennsylvania, who studies ninth-grade transition. ‘‘And that’s why it’s so important they get a good start in high school.”

Less than 60 percent of ninth-graders at three county schools went on to receive a diploma, according to a 2007 Johns Hopkins University study. As a result, the study labeled the schools — Bladensburg and High Point high schools, and Forestville Military Academy — as ‘‘dropout factories.”

School officials said the label was unfair, and did not take into account the progress being made at those schools. Overall, of the students who did continue through high school, there was an 83 percent overall county graduation rate last year.

The school system projects it will have a total of 12,850 ninth-grade students next school year, but only students struggling academically will be eligible for the summer program. The full-day program runs from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Monday through Friday and begins July 14.

Robert Beery, a director of the school system’s High School Consortium, which oversees the county’s 22 high schools, said middle schools are identifying students who had ‘‘not found a lot of success” in middle school, and encouraging their parents to support the students’ participation in the summer program.

Each high school will have a teacher for each of the four curricular areas, a program coordinator, guidance counselor, nurse and security personnel on site, said Diane Kanu, coordinating supervisor in the office of evening and summer high schools in the Office of Evening⁄Summer Schools.

Beery said the cost of the program has not yet been determined.

County high schools also will be starting ninth-grade academies — programs that provide a staff adviser for each freshman and provide other support for the students — in August that will continue students’ preparation for the 10th grade, Beery said.

The school system will use data it collects monthly from high schools on attendance, suspensions and academic achievement to gauge the program’s success.

Officials said they were not aware of similar programs at other area high schools.

School board Chairwoman Verjeana M. Jacobs (At-large) compared the program to the college custom of having freshmen start early to get acquainted with college life.

Board vice chairman Ron Watson said he would like to see schools implement transition programs for both ninth- and12th-graders. Many 12th-graders, he said, need post-high school help in areas such as financial literacy.

Bob Ross, president of the Surrattsville High School PTSA, supports the program and said he wants to make sure middle school parents are aware of it.

‘‘It’s an excellent program. There’s no doubt about it. Our incoming freshmen, to whatever high school they’re going into, they need some help,” Ross said. ‘‘And the summer bridge, if the concept works the way it’s supposed to work, is an absolutely fantastic program.”

E-mail Megan King at mking@gazette.net.