Frequently Asked Questions

Summer Boost provides up to $2,000 per student in funding for schools to design and implement high-quality summer learning programs for charter students completing kindergarten through 8th grades in spring 2023. In line with the existing body of research on effective summer programming, all Summer Boost programs must:

• Provide at least 20 days of instruction
• Provide both English Language Arts and Math instruction
• Provide an average of three hours of high-quality cumulative English Language Arts and Math instruction per day
• Ensure a student-to-teacher ratio of no more than 25-to-1
• Administer pre- and post-assessments provided by Summer Boost
• Conduct in-person instruction 

We know that a one-size-fits-all approach does not effectively meet the diverse needs of charter schools in this moment. Schools have flexibility to design programs with schedules that meet the needs of their students, teachers, and families. Additionally, schools can choose to opt in to the Lavinia RISE curriculum or select their own curriculum, as outlined in the table below.

No. Summer Boost sites must be in-person.

Yes! We want you to serve the students who need the program the most based on your own knowledge of your student body. We will provide funding for up to one-third (⅓) of your students in the targeted grade levels and we will ask you in the application to explain why you’re targeting the group of students you’ve selected.

Summer Boost is focused on students finishing kindergarten through 8th grade in spring 2023 (rising 1st to 9th graders) and does not provide funding for rising kindergarteners or rising 10th-12th graders. The Lavinia RISE curriculum provides rising 9th graders with a deep, rigorous program reinforcing standards from 8th grade in preparation for a strong start to high school. High schools may apply to serve incoming 9th graders.

Summer Boost provides flexibility for you to design necessary supports for your students, and we ask you to describe how you plan to accommodate students with diverse needs in the application. We will also provide venues for you to discuss approaches with other participating schools early in the summer. 

Additionally, the Lavinia RISE research-based program is designed to support English Language Learners and students with Special Education needs in the following ways: 

• Incorporates robust opportunities for group and partner discussion allowing students to practice their oral speaking skills.
• Offers phonics instruction that includes direct, explicit, sequential, and multisensory routines to support foundational reading skills.
• Gives students access to information in various modalities, such as text, diagrams, etc. 
• Provides opportunities for students to learn and keep track of content-area vocabulary. 
• Teaches students how to organize their thinking visually using notebooks and, where appropriate, additional graphic organizers.
• Includes partner reading and read aloud work so students are able to hear models of fluent reading and discuss their ideas with classmates. 

During the pre-program training, Lavinia Group will provide an asynchronous training on differentiated instruction to meet the needs of all students in one-on-one and small group settings. We encourage you to attend to learn strategies and best practices. Following the training and ongoing throughout the summer, we encourage you to reach out to Lavinia Group for support and guidance on how to support all learners.

If additional funding is available at the conclusion of the award period, we will work to disburse that funding to sites that are interested in serving additional students, and we will ask specific questions about that in the application to expedite the process. We anticipate those decisions will be made by the end of April. 

You can also use other funding sources to expand your program beyond the one-third (⅓) of students that will be funded by Summer Boost. We encourage combining funding sources to ensure a robust program model.

Schools can apply for up to $2,000 per student, depending on the length of the program and whether the program is full- or half-day:

• $80/student per day for full-day
• $55/student per day for half-day

We will ask you to provide an adjusted enrollment number near the end of your 2022-23 academic year, once you have begun recruiting for the program. Your grant amount will be updated to reflect that adjusted enrollment number and your allowable per pupil amount. Your first grant payment will be 70% of the adjusted grant amount. Your second grant payment will take into account the actual number of students you served and be adjusted accordingly, as outlined below:

• If your average daily attendance is at least 70% of the adjusted enrollment, you will receive 100% of the adjusted grant funding.
• If your average daily attendance is less than 70%, you will receive 70% of the adjusted grant funding. In this case, you will not receive a second payment.

Funds can be used to support many aspects of your summer program, as long as expenses are reasonable and aligned with your program design. This may include staffing salaries and teacher bonuses, curriculum, supplies and materials, enrichment activities, facilities costs, transportation, meals, technology and any other expenses you incur related specifically to summer learning as laid out in the budget template of your application. While we know attendance incentives can be valuable in encouraging consistent student attendance over the summer, gift card incentives are not allowable through Summer Boost funds. If you have questions about specific expenses, we would encourage you to reach out to the Summer Boost team.

You will receive a grant agreement from our fiscal sponsor, 50CAN, by May 15. We will ask you to provide an updated summer enrollment number near the end of your 2022-23 academic year, and your grant amount will be updated to reflect the adjusted enrollment number. Once we have your signed grant agreement and adjusted enrollment, we will begin processing your first payment.  You can expect to receive your first payment no later than June 30 if you complete all requirements on time. 

The balance of your grant will be paid out by September 30, contingent on completion of all reporting requirements and adjusted based on actual students served, as described under a previous question.

Due to the short timeline and the large amount of funding being distributed, we are committed to a two-payment schedule for funds. If cash flow is a challenge, one way you may manage is to structure a portion of your staff pay as a “bonus” or stipend that will be deliverable by October 31. This will give you time to collect your second grant payment before you incur your largest costs.

Yes, we have provided a budget template and calculator – linked in the application – where you can determine how much funding you are eligible for. You will be asked to provide a budget and a narrative to support that budget.

The budget you submit should only include the funding provided by Summer Boost. If you are using additional funding sources to support your program, you will be able to note that in the budget narrative, but we are not asking for a budget related to those funds.

Yes! You can view the application here. You will be prompted to make a copy so that you can draft your answers before entering them in the Google form.

No, the Google Form platform does not allow you to save and return to a draft application. We encourage you to complete the application in the downloadable Word version of the application (see previous question) and then copy and paste your responses in the Google Form once you are ready to submit.

Applications are due no later than 11:59pm ET on March 22, 2023.

We aim to notify all applicants of grant decisions by April 14. We will be reviewing applications on a rolling basis and will notify schools of application decisions earlier than April 14 if feasible. We encourage you to apply as soon as you can submit a strong application.

For schools using the Lavinia RISE curriculum, Lavinia is offering three program dates: 

• Session 1:
  • Teacher Training Dates: June 6-9
  • Student Program Dates:  June 12-July 14
• Session 2:
  • Teacher Training Dates: June 13-16
  • Student Program Dates: June 20-July 21
• Session 3:
  • Teacher Training Dates: June 27-30
  • Student Program Dates: July 5-August 4

*If you would like to use the Lavinia RISE curriculum and these Session Dates do not work for your school, please contact [email protected]

Lavinia RISE provides approximately three hours of curriculum daily. Schools using RISE can offer half-day programming or full-day programming. Full-day programming will require that schools identify a plan for enrichment in addition to the Lavinia RISE curriculum. 

For schools selecting their own curriculum, dates can be set by your school. The program must include at least 20 instructional days (full-day or half-day), with an average of at least three hours of English Language Arts and Math instruction each day.

Your daily schedule is up to you. The Lavinia RISE curriculum requires approximately three (3) hours per day to complete and you may want to add additional breaks or meal time. It is up to you to determine whether to add enrichment or other activities. Programs that are under five (5) hours per day are considered “half day” programs. Programs that are five (5) or more hours per day are considered “full day” programs. You can start and end your day at the time that works best for your staff and the families you serve. We strongly encourage you to consider the needs of your families, recognizing that a full-day schedule may work better for working parents and so support increased student attendance.

Programs that are under five (5) hours per day are considered “half day” programs. Programs that are five (5) or more hours per day are considered “full day” programs.

We’ve included a full day sample schedule below and indicated which activities are provided by the Lavinia RISE curriculum.

All programs must be a minimum of 20 days of instruction with a daily average of at least three hours of ELA and Math, but you have flexibility to design a program structure that makes sense for your school context.

The Lavinia RISE curriculum includes five days per week of instruction. Your school could choose to cover the curriculum in fewer days by making those days longer, but we recommend you consider the impact this might have on your students’ focus and interest.

We encourage you to apply and begin teacher recruitment with the caveat that you are awaiting approval on funding. You can recruit your own teachers and/or teachers from other schools to participate.

Teachers providing the ELA and Math academic instruction must be teachers that would be qualified to provide academic instruction at your school during the school year. We know that most charter schools have some flexibility related to licensure/certification so do not have a blanket requirement but do require that you use the same bar you would use during the school year to determine whether someone is qualified to teach a specific grade and subject area. The staffing plan for enrichment is up to your discretion and there are no requirements for licensure or certification, as long as you have a strong rationale. We encourage you to consider partnering with other community organizations to provide the enrichment component. Please note that schools are responsible for screening personnel that will be working with students this summer.

Of note, in summer 2022, high-performing grantees attributed their success to recruiting strong, experienced teachers; providing rigorous, structured curriculum and using data to inform instruction; and thoughtful staffing at the leadership level so that teachers were supported in their work.

We recommend that your most experienced and successful teachers are recruited for the summer program, and we ask you about your recruitment plans in the application. We built the funding model to allow generous compensation for teachers.

In summer 2022, many grantees found that paying teachers higher, competitive compensation due to the grant funding was a key strategy for recruiting teachers. Additionally, high-performing grantees — those grantees whose students made the largest gains over the summer as indicated by Lavinia pre- and post-test scores — emphasized in interviews how meaningful it was to be able to recruit more experienced teachers by offering higher pay than in prior years of summer programming. 

We know that salaries and cost of living vary widely across geographies, and we encourage schools to think, if possible, about what would be a significant rate of pay for teachers in their context in order to attract the best talent. As one example, the Indy Summer Learning Labs paid teachers $10,000 for their five-week program and professional development participation in 2021 and 2022. This rate attracted more than enough teachers for the program despite staffing challenges during the school year.

Yes! We encourage collaboration across schools to mitigate staffing or student recruitment challenges. Only one school/CMO should complete the application, but the lead applicant should provide details about the partnership in the application. Schools can also consider recruiting teachers from other schools or districts who may be interested in teaching in the summer.

Because attendance is key to success for students, grantees will be required to track and report attendance. We ask that grantees use their best efforts to engage families and students and encourage consistent attendance. Last summer, schools found that initial meetings with families to set expectations, phone calls when students were absent, and incentives were valuable means for improving attendance. 

Additionally, student attendance will influence your total funding amount. We understand that you need to staff and provide materials based on enrollment, and we have factored this into the calculation as noted below. See the Grant Funding Model section of this FAQ for more information.

•  If your average daily attendance is 70% or more of your adjusted enrollment (adjusted enrollment will be based on an enrollment report near the end of your 2022-23 academic year), you will receive 100% of your adjusted funding amount.
•  If your average daily attendance is less than 70%, you will receive 70% of your adjusted funding amount. In this case, you will not receive a second payment.

No, schools are responsible for designing transportation plans that will meet the needs of their students. We have increased the funding amount per student/per day in the budget calculator this year in order to help cover transportation costs. We will ask you to describe your transportation plans in your application. We also encourage you to reach out to your local education agency to understand if there are any transportation options being provided over the summer that you can leverage.

Yes! We are working with Lavinia Group to identify the charter schools with whom they are already working and absorb those costs into the grant structure so you will no longer incur those costs.

Yes! The application process will ask you to share more about your curriculum and the standards it targets. We want to support high-quality work in all forms. Summer Boost will provide the Lavinia RISE curriculum and professional development for FREE to any sites that choose to use it (NOTE: Schools will have to purchase student materials such as student books and math manipulatives; all materials beyond the Lavinia RISE curriculum are NOT free). We’re doing this because the curriculum has successfully led to student growth in several cities across the country. Because of this, if you do not have a curriculum already in place, we strongly encourage you to use the provided Lavinia RISE curriculum. ALL participating schools will be required to take the Summer Boost pre- and post-tests to help us understand student growth this summer (provided at no cost to participating schools). ALL programs must be a minimum of 20 days of instruction.

The Summer Boost pre- and post-tests are standards-aligned assessments following the standards map for both English Language Arts and Math. To understand how the assessments align with your state standards, visit the “Curriculum and Instructional Resources” section of the Lavinia RISE page.

The assessments are a combination of multiple choice and open-response questions. Students will take these assessments via the Edcite platform at the beginning and end of the summer program. The Edcite platform will be provided to all schools, and training on administering and scoring the assessment will be provided. This data will help the funders of Summer Boost understand what impact the program had on students. Because the assessments will be mapped to state standards, the data will also help schools understand how their students are doing and where they might focus with interventions after the summer program.

The Summer Boost pre- and post-assessments, developed by the Lavinia Group, are required for all participants, regardless of whether you use the Lavinia RISE curriculum or select your own curriculum. If you would like to administer additional assessments, that is at your discretion.

Training materials – including videos and resources – on assessment implementation and scoring will be made available online for participating sites to access at any time. All sites will also be able to attend optional office hours with representatives from Edcite, the assessment platform. Additionally, assessment implementation and scoring guidance will be covered during the Lavinia pre-program professional development week and this portion of the professional development will be made available to all Summer Boost grantees – including those that are not using the Lavinia RISE curriculum.

The assessments are untimed, but we estimate about 40-60 minutes for ELA and 40-60 minutes for Math – a total of up to two hours for the pre-tests and up to two hours for the post-tests. We encourage schools to offer the Math and ELA pre-tests on day one of the program and the Math and ELA post-tests on the second to last day of the program. However, there is flexibility around the logistics of this, and the tests could be administered over the course of two days if the site prefers (one day for ELA and one day for Math). We do not recommend administering assessments on the final day in order to allow time for teachers to score and enter the data for the assessments.

Summer Boost does not provide or endorse any specific enrichment programs. However, we strongly encourage sites to consider offering enrichment, as schools reported last summer that enrichment programming helped motivate student attendance and increase student engagement. We encourage sites to consider all options for enrichment, including recruiting special area teachers to teach courses and/or partnering with local organizations to help offer students and families full-day programming. Grantees are encouraged to include costs for enrichment partnerships, teachers, etc. as necessary in their program budgets. Summer Boost provides more funding for full-day than half-day programs to help cover these costs (please reference the calculator in the application budget template for more information).

The ELA and Math academic component of the program needs to be an average of at least three hours per day. Beyond that, schools have flexibility to determine the extent and types of enrichment programming provided.

At the conclusion of the program, schools will be required to complete (1) a narrative and financial report on a template provided by Summer Boost, describing how you used the funds in support of your program as well as key successes, challenges, and lessons learned and (2) a data report sharing anonymized student-level demographic information, attendance, and assessment results. Additional details will be provided in the grant agreement for selected schools and by our program team throughout the summer.

Participation in this initiative can help schools and the field learn about what is working in summer learning programs at a pivotal time when so many students across the country are struggling to recover from learning loss. In order to maximize the potential benefit for educators everywhere who are working on this challenge, we are asking that participating schools provide an independent researcher with de-identified student data, including summer data and data from school-year assessments the school has already chosen to administer (for example, i-Ready or NWEA). No students, school staff, or schools will be identified in any reports, and schools will receive reports with their individual schools’ results from the program. Data collection and submission assistance will be provided throughout the process. More information about the research and requested data will be shared in the grant agreements, and we will also ask you to sign a data sharing agreement.

Visit their website here or email them at [email protected].

Lavinia Group has added an additional Math Routines curriculum for this summer. This 20 minute Math block will build students’ conceptual understanding and procedural fluency, and provide teachers with resources to address a wide variety of key grade-level content.

Yes, Lavinia Group will join our Webinars to share more about their curriculum, and you can see samples of the curriculum on the Lavinia RISE website. If you want to ask Lavinia questions directly, email them here.

The Lavinia RISE required teacher training week includes asynchronous online modules as well as live, virtual sessions. These engaging trainings provide teachers with a program overview and professional development on each of the core components: Systematic Phonics (rising 1st-2nd), Close Reading for Meaning™, Insight Humanities™ Novel Study, Math for Meaning™ Story Problems and Math Routines. Lavinia Group will also offer optional sessions on small group instruction and differentiation. For more specific information, visit the Lavinia RISE page. 

Lavinia Group will also provide teacher professional development during the summer program. Each week, teachers will complete an asynchronous professional development module and then attend a live virtual meeting facilitated by a Lavinia Group coach. These meetings provide professional development for teachers, as well as an opportunity to ask questions about instructional practice related to the RISE curriculum. These sessions are for sites that are using the Lavinia RISE curriculum and are optional but highly encouraged.

We encourage you to consider these professional development time commitments when constructing your teacher compensation plans.

The costs of materials should be factored into the budget you submit to Summer Boost (Classes of 15 students should budget between $13-$39 per student for these materials and classes of 25 students should budget between $10-$28 per student for these materials, depending on the grade; see budget template in the application for more details). The curriculum and professional development will be provided at no cost to you, but the supplies are the responsibility of the grantee. Please email the Lavinia Group to request a detailed material list for the summer.

No. If choosing to engage in the Lavinia RISE curriculum, it is expected that the whole program will be implemented in accordance with the training and materials provided by Lavinia Group. We believe this adherence is important to retain the quality of the program. You are welcome to supplement the Lavinia RISE curriculum with enrichment and other activities.

Yes, the Lavinia RISE curriculum is meant to provide a high-quality academic component. Adding any additional support, programming, or resources is a decision you are empowered to make.

• Insight Humanities™ Book Studies (45 minutes daily): This curriculum rapidly develops students’ critical thinking skills, passion for reading, and ability to analyze any book they encounter. Students read, analyze, discuss, and write about highly-engaging, multicultural literature by award-winning authors.
• Close Reading for Meaning™ (45 minutes daily): Students will learn to independently access and understand complex text through a three-day cycle of reading for main idea, craft and structure, and mastery. The curriculum includes texts and aligned lesson plans.  
• Systematic Phonics and Shared Poem (45 minutes daily): Designed so teachers can personalize instruction and target existing gaps, this curriculum includes direct, explicit, and multisensory routines and materials that teachers can use throughout the summer and into the school year. 
• Math for Meaning™ Story Problems (45 minutes daily): Students develop the confidence and precision necessary to tackle any mathematical task independently while building their mastery of grade-level standards. This curriculum engages students in solving on and above grade level problems through hands-on learning and rich mathematical discourse. 
• Math Routines (15 minutes daily): The RISE Math Routines Curriculum is designed to build students’ mathematical fluency and conceptual understanding through targeted, discussion-based routines. Students build automaticity with operations and concepts while keeping the “why” behind strategies front and center.

The RISE 2023 curriculum and materials will be available to all educators in early May. Leaders and teachers will access the curriculum, professional development, and all accompanying resources through Lavinia’s online Summer School platform.

You will receive access to the curriculum as a downloadable PDF by grade-level on the RISE Summer School Platform. The materials will be labeled by the grade students will enter this fall. For example, students entering 3rd grade in the fall of 2023 will use the curriculum materials labeled “Rising 3rd Grade.” Schools can choose to print and organize these materials by day, week, or all in one batch for the summer session.

RISE Summer School is designed to accelerate student learning by ensuring all students are exposed to rich grade-level content and provided with responsive support when necessary. The summer curriculum and professional development courses are explicitly designed to help teachers utilize appropriate scaffolds and differentiation techniques in response to student data.

The curriculum allows students to have access to both word recognition and language comprehension strategies. Through the Phonics curriculum, students will receive explicit demonstration and practice in foundational reading skills. Through the Insight Humanities™ and Close Reading for Meaning™ curriculum, students will apply background knowledge, gain vocabulary, and make inferential meaning from a variety of texts in multiple genres.

All Lavinia school sites will receive a data tracker that they can leverage to keep track of student reading data and math data each week. The tracker will be managed by each individual school; Lavinia Group will not manage this data centrally. Informal data points have been pre-identified by Lavinia Group and are included on the RISE Summer School Pacing Guide. Teachers will use the Lavinia Group Rubrics for Literacy and Math to grade student work weekly.

School leaders will also have access to a comprehensive dashboard on the data tracker that provides a summary of student progress towards growth goals and overall standards mastery for their specific school. With this dynamic tracker, school leaders will have the ability to evaluate data across classes and grades as well as week-to-week throughout the program.

The focus of teacher training week is to develop an aligned vision for summer school instruction and to ensure teachers have ample opportunity to plan and practice the first few lessons of their summer curriculum. Our model of professional development is highly interactive and immersive. Throughout the training, teachers will be encouraged to discuss, debate, and ask and answer questions about content and instructional practices. 

Educators will have 4 hours of asynchronous pre-work and 2-3 days of live virtual sessions facilitated by Lavinia Group coaches. Teachers should reference the Teacher Training Week schedule in the “Onboarding & Professional Development” section of the Lavinia RISE website for more information on session times and days.

Lavinia Group coaches will facilitate weekly Intellectual Preparation and Student Work Study Meetings during the summer program for all math and literacy teachers. Facilitators will support teachers in differentiating to meet the needs of children based on student data and student work analysis.

These meetings provide professional development for teachers as well as an opportunity to ask questions about instructional practice related to the RISE curriculum. Each week, teachers will complete an asynchronous professional development module and then attend a live virtual meeting facilitated by a Lavinia Group coach. The weekly development meeting schedule can be found in the “Onboarding & Professional Development” section of the Lavinia RISE website. Since content meetings occur on alternate days, teachers that teach both Math and English can choose to attend all meetings each week, or one meeting each week for each content area. All meeting links will be accessible through the Summer School Platform.