"They Say We Are Wasting Our Summer": Latinx Student Perspectives on Remediation-Based Summer School

• In Event: Perspectivas y Problemas en Educación: Storytelling Across the Americas

Abstract

Individual districts and schools are often left to design and implement remediation-based and credit recovery summer programs as they see fit. These programs typically target students who have “failed” one or more core academic subjects, allowing them to recover credits needed for promotion or graduation. While there is a wealth of research which shows that Latinxs lag behind their peers in educational outcomes (Gándara & Contreras, 2009; Krogstad, 2016; Solorzano & Delgado Bernal, 2001; Telles & Ortiz, 2008; Valenzuela, 1999), there is little to no research on their experiences in school-based summer remediation.

Objective/Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to explore the perspectives of Latinx youth enrolled in remediation-based and credit recovery summer school programs across three Latinx-majority charter schools in the Northeast. Instead of taking these programs at face value as effective forms of remediation, this study centers student experiences and reflections to gauge efficacy. While the discourse around summer school and summer school students is often negative, this study investigates how Latinxs interpret their academic situation and future, as well as whether or not they see utility in their summer remediation programs.

Theoretical Framework
This paper utilizes Critical Race Theory, specifically the tenets of counter-storytelling and intersectionality, to present the diverse perspectives of Latinx students who have been labeled academic “failures” and choose to attend summer school. These counter-narratives demonstrate both shared and unique experiences across Latinx students of varying age, gender, nationality, and language ability who are all too often lumped together.

Methods and Data
Drawing from previous work by Kennedy et al. (2019), I use data and full-length quotes gathered from participant observation and semi-structured interviews with nine students to construct counter-narratives for each student. Through analysis across these narratives, I identify commonalities and points of discordance among their stories in order to highlight their experiences and perspectives of summer school.

Conclusions and Significance
The findings show that Latinx students hold conflicting feelings regarding how they came to be in summer school, what it means, and how it will affect their future. Across programs, the majority of students interviewed struggled with the stigma associated with summer school. Additionally, while some felt that summer school would prepare them for future academic success, others felt there was little point, and one student referred to it as “prison.” Finally, despite differences in experiences and programs and in spite of the summer school stigma, most participants held high academic expectations for their futures. However, it is worth noting that the perspectives presented here only represent Latinx summer school students who were willing and interested in participating in this study. This analysis demonstrates how complex Latinx summer school student perspectives are, as well as how deeply these youth reflect on their academic situation. These perspectives are vital for individual schools to investigate and incorporate into their design and implementation of summer remediation, which has the potential to either close educational gaps for Latinxs or exacerbate them.

Author

• Erika Davis, University of Florida