2024-25 SUMMER BRIDGE LEARNING BRIEF
By: Melanie Gonzalez, Chris Lewine, and Gretchen Philbrick
ABOUT THE SUMMER BRIDGE GRADE 9 STRATEGY
The importance of ninth Grade and high school success
Earning a high school diploma is a critical milestone for individuals, impacting their economic and health outcomes. A literature review conducted by the Office of Disease Prevention and Health Promotion found that not completing high school is linked to limited employment prospects, low wages, poverty, and potential poor health outcomes, including premature death1. Despite its importance, graduating from high school is a milestone that far too many young people in Connecticut and beyond do not achieve. A 2023 report from Dalio Education and the Boston Consulting Group found that one in five young people in Connecticut are either in danger of dropping out of school or have already dropped out and are unemployed2 Research from the University of Chicago shows that Grade 9 on-track achievement (i.e., whether a student earns enough credits to promote to Grade 10 after their first year of high school) is the best predictor of whether a student will graduate from high school within four years3
The challenges of the middle school to high school transition
Students experience significant changes and challenges during the transition from middle school to high school, which requires students to navigate a new school building, learn about credits and high school policies and expectations, meet new teachers and staff, and, in many instances, interact with new students and peers. During this transition, students often experience increased responsibility, autonomy, and anonymity at the same time as they are navigating hormonal changes and adolescent brain development. Many students experience negative academic and socio-emotional outcomes as they transition into the ninth grade. Studies have found that grades often decline from middle school to high school, with particular challenges experienced by Black and Latine students4; Grade 9 students experience more depressive symptoms and lower levels of school belonging compared to Grade 8 students5; motivation tends to be lower6; and engagement tends to be lower7. Furthermore, students lost a lot of ground during the pandemic in the core subjects of math and science and have had challenges catching up8
About RISE Summer Bridge programs
RISE partners with a network of high schools to support educators in studying their data, pinpointing needs, and pursuing new ideas or hypotheses. Nine years ago, East Hartford High School piloted a new Grade 9 Summer Bridge program, responding to the needs and challenges unique to the Grade 9 transition. East Hartford saw great success with this program and, over the years, many more partner schools have adopted and adapted the model to align to their unique school goals and contexts.
Summer transition programs can help students acclimate to a new school with less anxiety and more academic success9. RISE Network partner schools have developed and refined Summer Bridge programs over multiple years to support incoming Grade 9 students so that they can successfully adjust to high school. These programs, staffed by Grade 9 educators, counselors, administrators, and support staff, aim to (1) introduce students to their new school and high school expectations and (2) facilitate relationship-building between students, teachers, and peers. As a result of learning from multiple iterations of this program, RISE has established goals for Summer Bridge programs, outlined in Figure 1. RISE Summer Bridge programs set students up for success by helping them get familiar with the layout, systems, and rules of the school, teaching them effective practices for studying and time management, facilitating opportunities for them to meet and build relationships with other students and their new teachers, and even allowing them to get a head start by earning credits before their first day of school.
Schools enroll 20 percent of their incoming Grade 9 class in the Summer Bridge program
Schools’ recruitment efforts and programming efforts focus on students identified as “high risk” and “vulnerable” based on Grade 8 data
The Summer Bridge program is at least 40 hours in length, differentiating these programs from more common daylong or half-day orientation programs
ABOUT THIS SUMMER BRIDGE LEARNING BRIEF
The RISE Network supports school partners with actionable data, allowing educators to personalize support to individual student needs. In one of our data tools, the RISE Data Hub, we leverage the University of Chicago’s Risk and Opportunity (R&O) Framework to identify the support levels that Grade 9 students may need based on their Grade 8 experiences. Historically, RISE has seen the lowest Quarter 1 on-track rates among students with an R&O status of “high risk”. During the 2023-24 academic year, Summer Bridge implementers across eight of the nine RISE Core Network schools worked with RISE Grade 9 Success Coaches to focus their recruitment efforts on students with a R&O Status of “high risk” and “vulnerable” based on Grade 8 data, with the goal of supporting students in achieving higher on-track rates.
Key Terms:
RISK & OPPORTUNITY STATUS
High schools partner with feeder middle schools for Summer Bridge recruitment and back-to-school planning
QUARTERLY ON-TRACK STATUS
This brief aims to understand the relationship between Summer Bridge participation and student outcomes by assessing differences in Quarter 1 on-track outcomes of First-Time Grade 9 students who attended a Summer Bridge program in the summer of 2024 compared to those who did not. Additionally, we aim to understand the impact of Summer Bridge participation on specific student subgroups, including by R&O status, race/ethnicity, gender, multilingual learning (ML) status, and special education status. This brief will be used to help our network increase its understanding of who benefits most from our program in order to support program recruitment efforts for the 2025-26 academic year.
The RISE Network supports schools in identifying students who may be at risk of not graduating on time and may be in need of additional Grade 9 support by assigning students a Grade 8 Risk and Opportunity (R&O) status. Developed by the University of Chicago, the R&O framework places students within one of four categories based on their eighth-grade attendance and GPA data:
1. High Risk: Low GPA and low attendance
2. Vulnerable: Low GPA or low attendance
3. Opportunity: Moderate to high GPA and moderate to high attendance
4. High Opportunity: High GPA and high attendance
The RISE Network measures whether a student is fulfilling requiremens for the current quarter by assigning them a quarterly on-track status. RISE works with partner schools to create thresholds for these statuses using criteria such as grades and enrollment in required courses, placing students in one of three categories:
1. On-Track: earning the number of credits needed to promote
2. Almost On-Track: earning within 1-2 credits of the number of credits needed to promote
3. Off-Track: earning more than 2 credits fewer than what is needed to promote
Figure 1: RISE Network Summer Bridge goals
2024-25 SUMMER BRIDGE DATA INSIGHTS
Q1 on-track rates for Summer Bridge participants were 10 percentage points higher than non-participants
Across the RISE Core Network schools that implemented a Summer Bridge program, Summer Bridge participants (n=523) finished Quarter 1 with on-track rates 10 percentage points higher than their non-participant counterparts (n=2271, see Figure 2). This suggests that participating in Summer Bridge may have a positive impact on students passing a sufficient number of classes in their first quarter of high school.
On-Track Rates for Summer Bridge Participants and Non-Participants in Summer 2024, as of Q1 2024-25
Summer Bridge most benefited students who struggled in middle school and/or represent historically marginalized subgroups.
Across all subgroups by (R&O status, race/ethnicity, gender, multilingual status, and special education status) Summer Bridge participants ended Quarter 1 with higher on-track rates compared to their non-participant counterparts. Summer Bridge participants overall had similar demographics to Summer Bridge non-participants, however, there were some groups that were either overrepresented or underrepresented in the Summer Bridge program. For instance, students with an R&O status of “high opportunity” or “vulnerable”, female students, and students who are not multilingual were overrepresented in the Summer bridge participant group whereas male students and students who are multilingual were underrepresented in the Summer Bridge participants group, which may contribute to some of the differences we see (see Appendix for characteristics of Summer Bridge participants and non-participants).
Across all R&O status subgroups, Summer Bridge participants had higher on-track rates compared to their peers who did not participate in Summer Bridge, with the greatest differences seen among students with an R&O status of “high risk” and “vulnerable”. While all students with an R&O status of “high risk” had on-track rates that fell below the overall First-Time Grade 9 on-track rate, the “high risk” students who participated in Summer Bridge did much better at staying on-track than the “high risk” students who didn’t participate. Additionally, among students with a “vulnerable” R&O status, those who didn’t participate in Summer Bridge had lower on-track rates than the average firsttime Grade 9 student across the Core Network, but students with a “vulnerable” R&O status who participated in Summer Bridge performed better (see Figure 3). These differences between groups suggest that Summer Bridge most benefits students who struggled in Grade 8.
On-Track Rates for Summer Bridge Participants and Non-Participants in Summer 2024, by R&O Status
Participated in SB Did not participate in SB
Overall FTG9
Figure 2: Q1 on-track rates by Summer Bridge (SB) participants
Figure 3: Q1 on-track rates by Summer Bridge (SB) participation by R&O status, organized from the greatest difference between groups to the smallest difference
KEY RECOMMENDATIONS
Start or continue Summer Bridge programming
Across our overall Core Network, Summer Bridge participants are outperforming Summer Bridge non-participants based on Q1 on-track rates. Summer Bridge is intended to prepare students for the increased demands that come with the transition from middle school to high school. The 10 percentage point difference in Quarter 1 on-track outcomes between Summer Bridge participants and non-participants provides evidence of the positive effect that Summer Bridge is having on academic outcomes and in facilitating an effective transition from middle school to high school.
Recruit students with the highest needs for support for Summer Bridge
Our analysis of differences in Quarter 1 on-track rates between Summer Bridge participants and non-participants based on subgroups showed the greatest positive effect for special education students, multilingual students, Latine students, students with Grade 8 academic and attendance challenges (i.e., R&O status of “high risk”), and Black students, respectively. This analysis supports RISE’s recommendations to schools to prioritize the recruitment of students who experience Grade 8 academic and attendance challenges. This analysis of subgroup differences presents data insights that urge schools to consider if and how they might alter their recruitment efforts to also prioritize students based on identification with groups that have been historically marginalized.
Interested in learning more about the Summer Bridge strategy and RISE’s approach to supporting strong middle-to-high-school transitions?
Check out this blog post about the Manchester High School Summer Bridge program. Visit the RISE website to read about the Grade 9 Symposium and consider forming a team of educators to attend!
REFERENCES
1. “High School Graduation.” Healthy People 2030. Accessed November 1, 2024. https://odphp.health.gov/healthypeople/priority-areas/ social-determinants-health/literature-summaries/high-school-graduation#cit27
2. Boston Consulting Group. Getting Young People Back on Track: A Study of Connecticut’s At-Risk and Disconnected Young People. Dalio Education, 2023. https://www.dalioeducation.org/report/
3. Allensworth, Elaine, and John Easton The On-Track Indicator as a Predictor of High School Graduation. University of Chicago, 2005. https://consortium.uchicago.edu/sites/default/files/2023-06/The%20On-Track%20Indicator-Jun2005-Consortium.pdf.
4. Benner, April, and Sandra Graham. “The Transition to High School as a Developmental Process Among Multiethnic Urban Youth.” Child Development 80, no. 2 (March/April 2009): 356–376.
5. Newman, Barbara, Philip Newman, Sarah Griffen, Kerry O’Connor, and Jayson Spas. “The Relationship of Social Support to Depressive Symptoms During the Transition to High School.” Adolescence 42, no. 167 (Fall 2007): 441–459.
6. Barber, Brian, and Joseph Olsen. “Assessing the Transitions to Middle and High School.” Journal of Adolescent Research 19, no. 1 (January 2004): 3–30.
7. Di Pietro, Giorgio. “The Impact of COVID-19 on Student Achievement: Evidence from a Recent Meta-Analysis.” Educational Research Review 39 (May 2023). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.edurev.2023.100530
8. Calderon, Valeria, and Daniela Yu. “Student Enthusiasm Falls as High School Graduation Nears.” Gallup. Accessed November 1, 2024. https://news.gallup.com/opinion/gallup/211631/student-enthusiasm-falls-high-school-graduation-nears.aspx
9. DeLamar, Shawna, and Casey Graham Brown. “Supporting Transition of At-Risk Students through a Freshman Orientation Model.” Journal of At-Risk 19, no. 2 (2016): 32–39.
APPENDIX: CHARACTERISTICS OF SUMMER BRIDGE PARTICIPANTS AND
Appendix: Characteristics of Summer Bridge Participants and non-Participants
NON-PARTICIPANTS
Note: Students with characteristics highlighted in red were underrepresented in the Summer Bridge group by five percentage points or more and students with characteristics highlighted in green were overrepresented in Summer Bridge by five percentage points or more. Subgroups with a total population of less than 20 or with less than 5 students in the Summer Bridge participant and non-participant grouping are not reflected in order to protect anonymity.