Summer has a very different meaning for middle-and upper-income students than for low-income students.

I remember my childhood summers as carefree. I spent endless hours at the pool, learning to swim. I devoured books from the library. My parents sometimes enrolled me in summer camps, some of which I liked. I don't remember studying, exactly, but my mother was at home, and she was a sneaky teacher. I suspect I was learning without noticing.

For many families, summers are far from carefree. During the academic year, school is a place for learning, and more mundanely it's a safe place for kids to be five days a week. When school is out, families have to figure out where their kids can go, how to get them there, and how to feed them without the help of the school lunch program. Academic advancement isn't at the top of the list of priorities during the summer for most families.

Summers make achievement gaps worse

Learning is a cumulative process, like a rolling, growing snowball. Under the right conditions, learning sticks and kids grow academically. What they already understand serves as a base for what they learn next. Early learning sets the stage for kindergarten. Knowing letters sets the stage for reading words, then books. Learning English in school sets the stage for using it.

Decades ago, education researchers documented that summers melt the snowball effect of learning. When students stop learning for the summer, they start forgetting. This summer learning loss effect is uneven, of course — some families can afford enriching opportunities for their children in the summer, but others can't. Summers contribute to the achievement gap between students from higher-wealth and lower-wealth families.

Summers rarely shrink the achievement gap. But they could.

Some researchers, looking to quantify the amount of learning lost, have questioned the scope of academic harm caused. Perhaps the summer is more of a skid than a slide, they suggest. Either way, summers can be seen as a chance to make something different happen. Achievement gaps that are present in early childhood tend to be durable, and summers don't generally seem to make them better. But adding more instructional days in well-designed summer programs might.

Many suppose that the long summer break in the school calendar is somehow connected to America's agricultural past. This is a myth.

Many suppose that the long summer break in the school calendar is somehow connected to America’s agricultural past. This is a myth.

The complicated history of summer vacation probably has more to do with the sweltering discomfort of a stuffy classroom than with the needs of the fields.

From time to time, school districts consider shifting to a year-round schedule in which breaks are shorter and more evenly spaced through the school year. These conversations tend to emerge as a cheaper alternative to raising taxes for a school construction bond — using school facilities more evenly throughout the year allows them to be used more efficiently. Few districts have gone for it, but some have studied the idea.

Summer school costs money

There are many summer programs for children, but few are free, and not all are academically focused. In the economic downturn that began in 2008, school districts were given the option of doing away with summer school programs the state had previously funded. Many did so. One dedicated source of funding that remained for summer programs was through state and federal “extended learning” grants. Partly driven by matching grant challenges, some philanthropic and community organizations became interested in helping provide more summer learning opportunities and schools turned to them for help. In 2021, California authorized the Expanded Learning Opportunities Program (ELO-P), which helps fund after school and summer school programs for K-6 students.

In California, this all coincided with the development of some innovative new programs under the umbrella of the Summer Matters Network. These programs depend on an intentional synergy between the academic focus of traditional, district-led summer schools and summer camp programs that emphasize fun, engaging activities.

The myth of the summer job

For some teens, a "summer job" is literally a job, complete with pay. But teen summer jobs are actually much less common than you might think. According to the Pew Research Center, "The long-term decline in teens working during the summer is a specific instance of a broader long-term decline in overall youth employment." All over the world, teen employment has been on a long, steady slide for decades. In America, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that teen employment rates have fallen by nearly half in the last 20 years.

Less than a third of teens are employed in the peak month of July. White teens are employed in the summer at dramatically higher rates than nonwhite teens.

Over half of summer jobs for teens are in food service or retail, mainly at minimum wage. There is no persuasive evidence to predict whether rising minimum wages will increase or decrease teen employment.

For most students, working in the summer isn't an option. Most are too young, and the summer "job" for many older students is to look after their younger siblings while their parents are at work. For students living in poverty, summer can make their conditions worse. Their parents may find it harder to care for them while finding ways to earn money and keep food on the table.

Of course, summers are not the only time that students might be learning (or not) out of school hours. The next lesson examines what we know about the use of after-school time.

Updated June 2019, April 2021, June 2022, August 2022