Middle camp?

“On your mark, get set, go,” Laura Cambrelen said to her eighth-grade summer English class as she pressed the start button on her stopwatch.

Like the sound of a swarm of bees, a buzz emanated from Cambrelen’ s 20 students as they read their allotted paragraphs aloud simultaneously. Not one kid protested. Not one stumbled. And every student had finished reading before their teacher said “stop.”

This scene transpired at 11:15 — 10 minutes before the students’ lunch break.

In an effort to improve students as people, not just as test-takers, this summer the Pasadena Unified School District has added enrichment classes to their middle school curriculum. That means that in addition to 150-minute blocks of math and English, all sixth, seventh and eighth graders at Blair Middle School, part of Blair International Baccalaureate School, and Washington
Middle School have at least an hour and a half of improvisation, physical education and nutrition classes every day.

“I was nervous about teaching summer school,” said Blair math teacher Shannon Mumolo. “But there have been very few behavioral problems. I definitely think that the added enrichment is helping to keep the kids engaged.”

Although enrichment programs have long been a part of PUSD’ s curriculum during the school year, summer school has historically been designed solely to raise the standardized test scores of students who struggle academically.

“I don’ t think that there are many educators who are against standardized tests — but they aren’ t the be-all and end-all,” said Jonathan Lyons, one of Blair’ s summer school administrators. “Good teachers can teach both test-taking skills and the wider depth of knowledge that kids need to succeed.”

As part of PUSD’ s district-wide reform effort — the most noteworthy of which is John Muir High School’ s reinvention scheduled to begin this fall — the middle school enrichment programs are the first indication that their efforts may be paying off.

“The student retention rate this summer has been very positive,” said Mark Greene, the principal coordinator of the eighth-grade program at Blair. “The kids are definitely enjoying being here — which is good because I see this program as a bridge to their high school careers.”

A seventh- and eighth-grade math teacher at Wilson Middle School for eight years, Greene is part of PUSD’ s Aspiring Administrator program.

“I am hoping to be a full time administrator as soon as possible,” Greene said, adding that this summer’ s experience has solidified his belief in the importance of enrichment classes.

The original impetus for expanding the summer school programs came from last year’ s implementation of “Math Good Camp.”

“Last summer we gave all of our teachers extra training and even hired coaches for mathematics education,” said Felicity Swerdlow, former PUSD director of secondary education.

Swerdlow, who proposed this year’ s addition, added “I couldn’ t help but think that spending so much time on math and English was cruel and unusual punishment for kids. I am completely for improving the students’ academic performances, but I wanted to make summer school more fun — more like camp.”

As part of a separate grant from the regular summer school funding, the Pasadena Education Foundation provided for the addition of two art teachers, an improvisation teacher and a physical education teacher.

“We added these particular specialists for their universal appeal,” Lyons said. “The kids have definitely taken to the improvisation because it’ s so different from anything they’ve ever done.”
And the changes seem not only to have improved the lives of students and teachers, but even neighbors seem to have noticed.

Unprompted and unsolicited, retired Blair neighbor Judy Swayne approached Lyons while walking her dog. “At first I was not at all excited about having so many kids in the neighborhood all summer,” she said. “But they have been nothing but polite and considerate. One even helped me with my yard work last week.”

Laughing, she added, “Honestly, nobody paid me to say that.”

Swerdlow, whose primary goal is to prepare middle schoolers for the academic rigors they will encounter in high school, is pleased with the generally positive feedback she’s received.

“I am not at all squeamish about bad publicity when we make mistakes if it will improve the kids’ quality of education,” Swerdlow said. “But it truly is a pleasure to get validation when we do something right.”