After three years of hosting thousands of students, Pitt County Schools is planning for scaled-back summer programming this year.
The end of Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief funds is affecting school districts across the state and nation that have used the money for summer instruction to combat learning loss. The local school district, which had six weeks of summer school in 2021 and three weeks each of the last two years, is scheduled to return much of its summer programming to pre-pandemic levels.
“It is quite different from the past (three years),” Deputy Superintendent Steve Lassiter said in an interview. “Now that those funds have been depleted, we’re dealing with what we have in terms of our regular budget and allotment. We’re hoping to be able to take what we have and provide as much support as we can to those students who demonstrate the need.”
The loss of ESSER funds not only affects the number of students who can receive summer instruction but also the pay rate of teachers who commit to spending extra time in the classroom.
Pay incentives offered in 2021 helped draw hundreds of teachers into the summer school classroom, where they earned $40 an hour. Teachers were paid $30 an hour to work summer sessions in 2022 and 2023, when they also received a $1,200 sign-on bonus. Assistant principals and classified employees, including clerical staff, teacher assistants, school nutrition workers, custodians and bus drivers, also had a higher pay rate during the summer.
“We used ESSER funds to do that, but those funds have been depleted,” Lassiter said. “So we are not able to provide any additional bonuses for teachers this year, or administrators.”
The North Carolina Department of Public Instruction reports that, in the wake of COVID, school districts across the state spent more than $35 million in state and federal funds on summer programs to combat learning loss. According to DPI, while other summer program funding has been depleted, about $21 million in ESSER funding remains for schools to provide Summer Career Acceleration programs.
Until three years ago, Pitt County Schools’ summer programming involved credit recovery to give high schoolers a second chance to pass courses and Read to Achieve for qualifying third-graders. But in 2021, the state required districts to provide summer instruction to help make up for class time missed due to the coronavirus pandemic.
More than 3,500 Pitt County Schools students attended summer sessions in 2021. In 2022, about 2,700 of the district’s 23,000 students attended three weeks of summer school. By 2023, that number had decreased to around 2,000.
Chief of School Support Kamara Roach, who was recently named interim assistant superintendent of educational programs, said the return to pre-COVID programs means the school system will again provide credit recovery at six high school locations for eight days in June. Twelve days of Summer Reading Camp will be provided at 14 sites for students in kindergarten through third grade whose test scores indicate they need additional instruction.
“I think a highlight for us this summer is CTE (career and technical education) camps,” Roach said, adding that the fact that camps filled so quickly “just shows us and tells us that there is an interest in CTE and those types of jobs.
“We’re excited about having those this summer,” she said.
Summer Career Accelerator camps, which started in 2022, are being held at eight locations in June for middle and high school students. Camps focus on topics including computer science, graphic design, drone operation, entrepreneurship and empowerment. Some camps, such as CPR, offer students a chance to receive a certification, while others, such as agriculture, focus on field trips.
Director of Career and Technical Education Kali Beach said all camps will provide hands-on activities. Some, such as culinary camps, have proved to be especially popular. More than 300 students signed up for one of 18 camps before registration closed.
“Clearly, kids do want to do things over the summertime,” Beach said. “I think this shows that career and technical education is a huge resource that all students should be tapping into, whether they want to go straight into a career field or go to college. Having these camps really helps these students to just continue exploring and making decisions about what they want to do for a career.”
Because of remaining ESSER funding, camps are offered for free, and transportation is available.
“This is the last year that we will have this type of funds,” Beach said. “I wish they were going to provide funding every year. It’s a very popular thing in all counties, but it is also a very expensive thing to be able to host all of this.”
PCS Director of Secondary Education Monica Jacobson said the school district will continue to offer the Transition to Middle and High School programs that it began in 2022. The orientation programs involve older students serving as positive role models who welcome rising sixth-graders and rising ninth-graders and help them adjust to their new school. But unlike some of the longer transition programs held in recent years, this year’s orientations will be limited to one or two days.
“It is a smaller scale,” Lassiter said of the overall summer program options. “But we’re going to work as hard as we can to touch and impact many as students who need the support.”
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