No Summer School This Year, Heights Superintendent Says

Supt. Thomas Amadio dropped a bomb on the District 170 school board when he said the State Board of Education told him there would be “no summer bridges” this year.

Amadio said at the school board meeting Monday night, the state does not plan to fund any summer programs, which would dramatically change the plans of many families in the Heights.

“There has been no money allocated to summer school,” Amadio said. “That’s going to affect probably 2,000 kids here.”

The biggest concern, according to Amadio, is for kids who were a part of the bridging program partly because they had nowhere to go during the summer.

“There’s going to be kids that—I don’t know what they’re going to do this summer,” Amadio added. “So we’re going to have to come up with some summer camps for the kids.”

For Roosevelt School teacher Diane Gregor, the announcement that there would be no summer school is far too common, and the verdict often changes.

“This isn’t anything new,” said Gregor, who is also the president of the teacher’s union at District 170. “A lot of teachers don’t find out until a couple of weeks before the end of the school year that there will be summer school.”

While the revelation of no summer bridges has been heard before, the timing of it this year is a bit strange, according to Gregor.

"This is new, hearing it this early,” Gregor said. “But still, it’s back and forth. They change their minds.”

District buildings and grounds supervisor Ron Mascitti said he has grown accustomed to the State’s flip-flopping as well, adding he’s even seen the number of buildings that could have summer school go up and down.

“First, [the State] will say it’ll only be some schools that have summer school,” Mascitti explained. “Then it’s all of them. First, they don’t have the money. Then they do.”

Amadio said he is not sure what the Illinois Board of Education will ultimately say.

“I asked them, ‘Could this change,’” the superintendent said. “They said, ‘Of course it could change, but this is where we are now.’”