Kingston school district superintendent Paul Padalino provided an update on the district’s summer school program, which began Monday, July 5, at last week’s school board meeting.
“This is the first time we’ve ever hosted our own summer school,” Padalino said. “We usually have it with BOCES and many school districts participate.”
Padalino said that there are 397 students in summer school at Kingston High School, 200 at J. Watson Bailey Middle School, 125 at George Washington Elementary School, and 100 at the students with disabilities program at Harry L. Edson Elementary School. He added that he expected the second summer session to be even larger.
“That requires the creation of a whole new master schedule and basically a mini-school year within the school (district),” Padalino said, adding that the district would like to continue in this vein. “We probably won’t change this moving forward seeing the number of students we have participating. It far outnumbers what we’ve had in the past, and we’re really excited to have this many students on our campuses…We’re running a school district about the size of some of our neighbors during the summer here in Kingston. It’s an exciting time.”
The summer school program isn’t just larger than in the past, it’s different programmatically as well.
“We want to be academic, but we also want to hit that social and emotional piece of the puzzle and give students a reason to come, and the day is blended,” Padalino said. “For example, a ninth-grade student may have math, and then his next period he’s working with CCE (Center for Creative Education). It’s almost like electives in a regular school day. Usually summer school is drill and kill. It’s for students who weren’t passing, especially at the secondary level, and it’s Regents’ review, Regents’ review, Regents’ review to get to that Regents’ exam. We’re extending the day a little bit, blending in those community partners.”
Join the family! 
