The Los Angeles Unified School District’s second round of bonus school days designed to address learning loss among students across all grade levels, are set for April 3 and 4 during spring break.
“Acceleration Days” are the brainchild of LAUSD Superintendent Alberto Carvalho, who hopes students can catch up in two years after they lost five years of academic ground during the pandemic.
While the extra days offered to students during the holiday break are targeted at high-need students — such as English Language Learners and students performing below academic standards — the extra day are open to all, and offer small group learning support, enrichment activities and assignment do-overs.
“We know any and all of our students could really benefit from additional learning time,” said Dr. Karla Estrada, LAUSD deputy superintendent of instruction. “It’s one of the things we’re really leveraging as one of our strategies to accelerate learning in addition to expanding our tutoring opportunities.”
Some of the enrichment activities on offer include hands-on STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) labs, dances classes, art workshops and virtual field trips.
The first set of acceleration days were held at the start of the schools’ winter break and had lackluster attendance. More than 70,000 students registered but only about 40,000 showed up for at least one day.
The district hopes that more students will attend the upcoming enrichment days, which have taken on increased importance because children in LAUSD schools lost three days of learning from March 21 to 23, when classroom were shuttered due to the historic strike. The walk-out was led by members of the service union SEIU Local 99 and members of the teachers union, United Teachers Los Angeles, joined them on the picket line in a show of solidarity.
Estrada said students who attend on April 3 and 4 will see two key changes in response to lessons LAUSD officials learned from the first…
Read the full article here
