Kyle Dubin has spent part of his summer vacation in the very place he might otherwise want to avoid until the fall: a classroom at Rosemont Middle School in La Crescenta.
For three hours each day, he has learned how to do research and organize his time as part of a study skills class in Rosemont's summer school program.
Taking classes over the summer gave him "something to do," said the soon-to-be seventh-grader. And though his mother pushed him to take study skills, he had hoped to take a math class too, in part to get a jump on algebra.
But he was turned away from the algebra class -- "because of the budget cuts," the 12-year-old said.
Traditionally, there have been two kinds of summer school courses, both of which have been mostly free to students in the state's public schools.
Remedial classes, usually mandated to keep struggling students from falling behind or having to repeat key subjects, have not been affected much by state budget cuts.
But enrichment classes, which allow students to take extra classes over the summer in anticipation of a busy regular school year, or to get ahead in subjects such as science and math, are feeling the brunt of the cuts. Class sizes around the state have gotten bigger. Some courses have been eliminated.
In the Glendale Unified School District, which includes Rosemont, the number of students in most summer enrichment classes has risen to almost 40 per class, from the low to mid 30s last year. If enrollment wasn't very strong, classes were consolidated or dropped, said Mary McKee, assistant superintendent of education services. Some students even had to move from one campus to another in the middle of the summer term.
Rosemont had to turn away 200 students -- "more than usual" -- from its enrichment classes, said Principal Sally T. Buckley.
On a recent day at Rosemont, a group of incoming seventh-graders took a reading comprehension quiz in an English classroom. They scribbled away, filling in the blanks with words or phrases, as a teacher looked on. This year, just one section of the English enrichment course was offered instead of the usual two.
"We were saying, don't count on baby-sitting," Buckley said. "Summer school doesn't look like it did when we were kids."
In Orange County, the Santa Ana Unified School District cut the number of middle and high school enrichment classes by 20% to 30% this summer. At the elementary level, two out of three such classes were eliminated.
