National Summer Learning Week Promotes Importance of Summer Learning

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Johnstown, PA (July 7, 2023) – Did you know that 9 in 10 teachers spend at least three weeks re-teaching lessons at the start of the school year, according to a survey by the National Summer Learning Association (NSLA)? Yes, summer vacation is a break from school, but it doesn’t have to be a break from learning. That’s why the NSLA has designated July 10 – 14, 2023 as National Summer Learning Week. The week-long event invites parents, teachers, libraries, and other youth-serving organizations to discover the power of summer with activities and resources that promise to broaden young people’s minds, reignite their love of learning, and reduce summer learning loss.

The Learning Lamp actively engages children in summer learning—not just for one week but all summer long. With preschool and school-age summer camps operating at sites in Cambria, Somerset, Bedford, Fayette, and Westmoreland counties, The Learning Lamp is keeping kids’ brains buzzing this summer. In addition to children that are typically enrolled in our child care centers and enjoy camp activities, our stand-alone summer camps enrolled 219 campers that registered for a combined 1,563 summer camp slots this year. Themes range from Superheroes and Summer Safari for preschoolers to Building Bonanza and Backpackers for our school-aged world travelers.

The Learning Lamp also offers FREE standards-aligned summer camp lesson plans to any organization in Pennsylvania to use with their own children. Licensed and unlicensed child care providers, Boys and Girls Clubs, YMCAs, and other school- and community-based summer programs can access the Best Day Ever! lesson bank through Labor Day. The resource includes 12 weeks of lesson plans each for preschool and school-aged camps—a perfect fit for under-resourced providers and a way to ensure equity in summer learning for children of all incomes and from all zip codes. To date, the Best Day Ever! free summer trial has registered 580 providers from 55 of PA’s 67 counties.

“When children can continue learning over the summer, they are less likely to lose the skills that they worked so hard to master during the school year, and we are seeing a tremendous demand for high-quality lesson plans this summer,” said Dr. Leah Spangler, President & CEO of The Learning Lamp. “The providers who are using Best Day Ever! have downloaded a combined 4,604 lesson plans for camps serving 39,578 children across Pennsylvania. Even if they are operating short-staffed, providers can use Best Day Ever! to make the most of this summer for the children they serve.”

The Learning Lamp’s one-to-one tutoring program is also enrolling students for summer learning, as is the agency’s school-based division, Ignite Education Solutions. Ignite’s summer credit recovery program offers students a second chance to earn a passing grade in a course that they struggled with during the school year. Students and families can pick from a fully online program with certified teachers or an in-person option. Ignite provides weekly progress and grade updates and communicates with families regularly to help students complete summer sessions successfully. To date, Ignite’s teachers have guided 199 students from eight counties as far west as Allegheny and northeast as Lycoming through summer credit recovery coursework. Offering this program to families in partnership with their children’s home school districts allows students to earn the necessary credit to advance to the next grade level, continue to participate in vo-tech programs, sports and extracurriculars, and even graduate with their class.

For more information on The Learning Lamp’s summer learning opportunities, visit thelearninglamp.org. Click here to access free lesson plans from Best Day Ever! And to learn more about free summer learning resources families can use at home, visit discoversummer.org.

The Learning Lamp is a nonprofit organization with a mission to engage all children in the support they need to succeed. We deliver high-quality programs that are affordable and accessible to families of all income levels. In 2022, The Learning Lamp served 34,813 youth/adults from 61 public school districts and 70 other schools and organizations in 22 Pennsylvania counties.

 Our programs include: child care and preschool, after-school programs, tutoring, SAT prep, school staffing, alternative education programs for at-risk students, online learning, credit recovery, drug and alcohol prevention programs, and grant writing and project consulting for schools.