D.C. summer-school enrollment dips with invitation-only policy As the end of the school year approached, school officials realized that invited students would not fill the 2,700 available slots. Officials then opened the program to all K-8 students and as of late June had filled 90 percent of seats, with hundreds more on wait lists. But many students did not show up, and as of late July, only 1,827 were enrolled. The school system's K-8 program represents its central summertime effort to change the trajectory of low-performing elementary and middle school students, including more than 10,000 struggling readers. Meanwhile, a summer program for rising freshmen - part of a broader effort to improve ninth-grade performance - enrolled 1,244 students. An additional 1,549 students are in high school summer programs, and 2,800 children attend publicly funded camps run by community-based organizations. Still other students are attending summer programs run by individual schools. Research has shown that children tend to lose academic ground during the languid summer months. The problem is especially acute for poor children, who often have less access to out-of-school enrichment than their more affluent peers. Although the District's did not meet its enrollment target, the program - once totally disconnected from school-year academics - has made important strides, spokeswoman Melissa Salmanowitz said. "For the first time this year, we have a summer-school curriculum that aligns to the work the students do during the school year and meets the specific needs of students," Salmanowitz said. Based on the success we've seen with that model, we will work aggressively to serve more students in summer school going forward. In addition to tying summer learning to school-year expectations, officials required this year's summer-school teachers to be rated effective or highly effective in order to work. They were handpicked. That makes a huge difference," said Gladys Hetherington, a teacher who is serving as the principal at Brookland Education Campus, one of eight sites for the K-8 program across the city. Another summer site, Bancroft Elementary School in Mount Pleasant, buzzed one recent morning with the same kind of routines and lessons that are common during the school year. In one classroom, students sat at desks writing about characters in the novel they'd been reading together, the E.B. White classic "Charlotte's Web." In another, an aide taught a small-group lesson tailored to students" particular struggles. In a computer lab, fifth-graders clicked away at software designed to reteach and reinforce math skills.