Summer Boot Camp
The summer boot camp starts the summer before the first semester. The aim is to prepare our students for high school education, especially the students’ foundation in reading, writing, and mathematics--the three most fundamental discipline that Adam Smith points out in his Wealth of Nation. The instructors are mostly senior-level students and volunteers from nearby universities. Sometimes our regular teachers will participate if they volunteer to do so. As it is widely known, academic gap increase after the summer, because some kids are from families that can continue providing them educational resources during summer break. Hence, after the first academic year, we will continue to offer summer boot camp to prepare our students for the academic skills necessary for their coursework next year.
Since our students came from a probabilistic sample, we do foresee that some of our incoming students will be less prepared than others. To deal with this problem, we have two voluntary programs for students who feel less prepared:
The afterschool mentorship program is offered in both spring and fall semesters. At the beginning of each academic year, we will match seniors with students who wish to participate in the program as mentees. Everyday after school, the senior mentor will help their younger mentees with their homework and other problems relevant to study or life in general. We believe such program can not only allow the mentee to catch up with their classmates, but also enable the mentors to consolidate what they have learned. Note that mentee should try to complete their homework on their own before asking their mentor for help.