Summer…. for most Edina students, it is an exciting time to enjoy countless enrichment opportunities – organized sports, camps, tutoring, lessons, and quality time with parents. But for the 10% of Edina students who struggle with poverty, summer can be a vulnerable time. School is dismissed for several months, days become vacant and unstructured, and nutritious meals provided by the Federal Free and Reduced Meal program are unavailable. The National Summer Learning Association notes that “more than half of the achievement gap between lower and higher income youth can be explained by unequal access to summer learning opportunities.  As a result, low income youth are less likely to graduate from high school or enter college.”
Over the past year, as Edina Give and Go has become more attuned to the challenges of Edina’s neediest students, the particular vulnerabilities that children face during summer have become more apparent and more concerning. During the summer of 2014, we collaborated with Edina Public Schools and Edina Community Education to create Summer is GO Time— a program which is changing the landscape of opportunity for low income Edina youth of all ages by funding access to many robust and enriching summer experiences. We plan to expand the Summer is GO Time program this summer, and we need your help. Read the stories below and GIVE so that Edina students in need can participate in summer opportunities that will help them GO far in the future!