Q&A
DOE officials explain Summer Rising program flexibility and enrollment challenges
1:13:32
·
3 min
DOE officials explain the intentional flexibility of the Summer Rising program and discuss the challenges associated with enrollment and attendance tracking.
- The program is designed to be free and optional, without strict attendance requirements
- Officials note that attendance trends show fewer students later in the summer, which may align with family plans
- Efforts are being made to improve the enrollment process, focusing on early enrollment by April
- Changes have been made to the policy around mandated and promotion-in-doubt students to maximize seat availability
- Officials emphasize the goal of enrolling students who want the full program experience, including the CBO portion
Emma Vadehra
1:13:32
So so, well, we will get you the number and what school your attendance is.
1:13:37
I will say I don't think we actually see it as the same thing in terms of the comparison.
1:13:42
Right?
1:13:42
This is a free optional program that we intentionally make available without saying you have to come 65% of the time or 70% of the time.
1:13:53
We know we see trends over the course of this summer.
1:13:56
We have fewer students later in the summer.
1:13:58
That could be because that's what family plans look like, which is fine.
1:14:01
Right?
1:14:02
We allow that, we allow that level of flexibility.
1:14:04
I'm not saying there's not always room for improvement, and this is something we are collectively looking at closely in terms of what is the student experience, how do we make sure we're enrolling kids who actually wanna be there, which is one of the pieces of improving enrollment at the beginning of the process when families are actually making planning decisions as opposed to popping a kid onto the enrollment role in July and realizing that's probably the person already has something else planned, right, which is a part of the challenge.
1:14:32
SO I WOULD SAY I DO THINK THAT IT IS DIFFERENT FROM SCHOOL YEAR AND THAT WE INTENTIONALLY MAKE IT FlexIBLE FOR FAMILIES TO BE IN AND OUT, TO NOT MANDATE A CERTAIN THING, TO ALLOW THEM TO OPT OUT.
1:14:45
A COUPLE WEEKS, WE COULD We could change that, I suppose.
1:14:48
We do talk long and hard about how to change this program every year for whatever it's worth and continue to try and improve.
1:14:54
That is not something we've been looking to change because we think that flexibility in a free program is actually appropriate.
1:15:02
I think on the 9000 students, I do think it's a it's a fair question.
1:15:06
We do those some of those are the students who were originally enrolled.
1:15:12
The students that chair Stevens was speaking about were originally enrolled.
1:15:16
We did some outreach.
1:15:19
They show up in our enrollment numbers, but they don't show up in our attendance numbers.
1:15:23
So some of them are those students that are explaining that part of the differential as well, or a similar student who might have gotten an offer later in July, said, yes, I want this, then actually they didn't because by then they were, of course, doing something else.
1:15:36
And so it's some of those situations too that are leading to that gap between the 101 and the 110.
1:15:43
The one other thing I will say is just We do see a lot of that as how do we think about the upfront enrollment process to get as many folks in by April.
1:15:54
Right?
1:15:54
Thank you, Angela, for the April date.
1:15:56
We do think those are the families that are more likely to come.
1:15:59
They're going to be able to plan around this.
1:16:02
That's actually one of the reasons we made the change around mandated and promotion in doubt.
1:16:07
We were holding back students.
1:16:08
We were holding back seats at what we think is the critical stage for enrollment.
1:16:13
For students who we didn't know yet who they were.
1:16:17
And we didn't know if they even wanted the CBO portion of the experience, right, which we know is a limited thing.
1:16:22
So it's a challenging piece, the mandate and a promotion and doubt piece.
1:16:28
But given it is a scarce resource, I think we've we really wanna make it available for kids who raise their hand, kids and families and say, I want this full set of the experience, and that is one of the reasons we change that policy as well because we think as many kids as we can over enroll a bit if we need to, way up in April so families can plan is how we're gonna get students to come and keep coming.
