Tennessee Says Camps Made Up Education Losses From Pandemic, Especially For Disadvantaged Students

New test results indicate that Tennessee public school students saw improvements in math and reading through the state’s summer learning program, state officials say.

The program was the first of its kind, in an effort to address potential learning loss caused by the pandemic. More than 120,000 students across the state enrolled and over $160 million was spent to run the program.

“This past summer, Tennessee school districts launched rich academic programs and thoughtfully prioritized student and family engagement to help their students get extra learning time and recover from a very tough school year,”  Education Commissioner Penny Schwinn said in a press release. “In doing so, they built tremendous momentum for students and staff heading into a brand new and still very tough school year.”

According to Schwinn, elementary school students saw an improvement of 7.34 percentage points in English and language arts and 11.66 percentage points in math. Meanwhile, middle school students made saw an improvement of 0.66 percentage points in English and language arts and 6 percentage points in math.

Schwinn also said economically disadvantaged students had improved at the same rate as their non-economically disadvantaged peers.

“Typically what we see is that our economically disadvantaged students improve at a slightly lower rate,” Schwinn told state lawmakers at a hearing on Wednesday.

She attributed the academic gain to the quality and structure of the summer program, including its small class sizes.