Reading is fun
At a time when many youngsters are content to enjoy summer vacation anywhere, as long as it is far away from school, Laurel Highlands School District got a record turnout for summer school. “We had 153 kids. That’s a large number. Each year, as word has gotten out to parents, we have gone up. We had 85 last year, so we almost doubled our previous turnout,” said Carol Bubonovich, the school district’s federal funds coordinator.
Bubonovich talked about attendance on Thursday, the last day of Laurel Highlands Summer Reading and Math Camp. She said the program is called a camp because the children are having fun while they are learning.
This was the fourth year for what has become a five-week program. It got under way June 16 at R.W. Clark Elementary School and was held Mondays through Thursdays from 9 a.m. to noon. Students from pre-kindergarten through sixth grade were invited to attend. They received breakfast and lunch and one hour of instruction each in math and reading.
Bubonovich said two teachers were employed for each grade level, and they worked with just 10 students each, using instructional kits in the youngest grades and an interactive, Internet-based computer program with the older students.
“This helps the kids to retain, review and reinforce what they learned through school. It’s more laid back, and that’s why we call it camp,” Bubonovich said.
She said school officials are working to track the academic progress of the students who participate, but she said parents already have offered some feedback, saying their children wanted to attend and could not wait to get there.
She said the pre-kindergarten class had the highest enrollment of 28 children who she said got a boost from the program to enter school.
Teachers make referrals for students that need a little extra help over the summer, and some of them attend, but Bubonovich said not all of them could make it to the school in the summer because of a lack of transportation. She said she would like to provide transportation next year.
The challenge is the funding, said Bubonovich, who listed the various grant resources she pooled to operate the program with no money from the school district’s general fund.
“The summer program cost about $30,000 with materials. All of it was grants,” she said.
The grant sources that helped cover the costs included Read to Succeed, Westmoreland-Fayette Workforce Investment Board, the state’s pilot literacy program with Voyager Extended Learning and DARE2XL of Penn State Fayette, as well as some money from the school district’s federal Title I and Title V grants.
Also used was the 21st Century Community Learning Center grant that went into effect this summer as a joint venture for Laurel Highlands, Albert Gallatin Area, Brownsville Area, Connellsville Area and Frazier school districts.
The districts collectively received the three-year grant of about $960,000, which included a summer component and after-school programs that will get started this fall.
Bubonovich said she will work to put together a funding package for next summer, and she looks forward to even higher attendance at that time.
“The more kids that come, the more money I will find,” she said.