Photo by Christina Sturdivant
Next school year, students at 11 DCPS schools will be in classes a bit longer—20 days to be exact. Mayor Muriel Bowser and DCPS Chancellor Kaya Henderson made the announcement at a press conference today at Hart Middle School in Southeast.
Raymond Education Campus in Ward 4 served as a pilot this school year. Ten elementary and middle schools, mostly in Wards 7 and 8, will join Raymond in adding days to the front and back ends of next school year. The additional days carry a $5.5 million price tag.
One of the initiative’s main goals is preventing the “summer slide,” Mayor Bowser said, referring to the fact that students tend to lose some of the academic gains they made during the previous school year.
For instance, on a visit to H.D. Cook Elementary School, At Large Councilmember and Education Committee Chair David Grosso was told that when students left for summer break, their reading levels were at about 68-69 percent, and when they came back, their levels fell to about 30 percent, he said.
Parents, principals, and school communities decided which campuses would receive the additional days, Henderson said, as it’s not a cookie cutter approach. “It makes sense for some schools, but not others,” she said. Last year, 41 schools offered an extended day for some students. Some of those schools were able to swap out longer days for longer school years, Henderson said.
During the 2015-2016 academic year, Raymond added 10 more days to the traditional 180 day school year. This fall, Raymond and the following schools will add 20 days, for a total of 200 school days (and two additional weeks will be provided for students who need extra support).
Luckily for students, the extra days haven’t been all work and no play, explained Raymond Principal Natalie Hubbard.
In September, her students took a trip New York to see The Lion King on Broadway, and visited Radio City Music Hall and Rockefeller Center, Hubbard said. Throughout the rest of the year, they will participate in field trips such as skiing, overnight camping, and touring their hometown.
For parents, the additional school days mean knowing that students are in a safe space and not having to worry about summer camp (summer break is shortened to three weeks), Hubbard said. As for her pupils, “there’s nothing more rewarding than seeing students who attend school because they want to be there.”
There are still several areas that DCPS needs to work on addressing, Henderson said in October at her State of the Schools Address. In particular, she noted concerns about the achievement gap between white and black/Latino students, the decline of African American teachers in DCPS, and a high school graduation rate that’s well below the national average of 81 percent (it was 64 percent at the time).
