Summer may be a time to relax for some schoolchildren, but state and local statistics show that others should be studying.
And even the best interpretation of fuzzy, preliminary statistics shows that too many of those who should be are not.
Under the 2001 No Child Left Behind Act, schools with students not making adequate yearly progress must provide tutoring.
But many are not receiving it.
Statewide, 26,732 students were eligible to receive tutoring for this school year, and as of December, 5,532 were receiving it.
Statistics are not yet available for the number of students who received tutoring, or “supplemental services” as educators call it, during the entire year.
In Baltimore City, 18,162 students were eligible for tutoring this year.
But only about 7,350 received it, as preliminarily estimated by the Baltimore City Public Schools in mid-February.
In Harford County, 400 children of 515 eligible at Magnolia Elementary received tutoring as of September 2005; in Anne Arundel in 2004-05, 90 children of 533 eligible received help.
Preliminary Baltimore County numbers show 970 students eligible, with 234 registered.
Carroll and Howard counties reported no eligible children because their schools made enough progress to rise abovethe requirement.
What?s the problem? Why are so few children receiving the help they need and that the law requires?
The Washington Post reported last month that many children in rural areas do not receive tutoring because they do not live near alternative education services.
That is not the case here.
We?d like to hear why the city and surrounding school systems cannot find tutors for students who need them. So would their parents.
Driving the shortfall could be the fact that 42.1 percent of secondary school teachers in the state are not fully certified and are not on a path to be. At the elementary school level, 19.1 percent of teachers are not fully certified nor on a path to be, according to the Consolidated State Performance Report for 2004-05.
Our students deserve a chance to learn.
School systems not providing adequate “supplemental services” must submit plans that show how they intend to match eligible students with tutors before the next school year starts.
Asking our distinguished universities for help in crafting a solution to the problem might be a good place to start.
