More and more summers being dedicated to summer school

An increasing number of students are now spending several weeks of their summer vacations in summer school. Multiple schools in and near Saratoga are offering classes to high school students during the summer, including Saratoga High, West Valley College and De Anza College.

For example, sophomore Benjy Yang will be taking a biology class and math class this summer as part of at least a four-week program.

“I’ve been thinking about marine biology and Trig/Precalc for next year,” Benjy said. “I’m taking Trig/Precalc Honors next year [at Saratoga High].”

He also said that his reasoning for taking summer school has a lot to do with his personal curiosity in certain subjects.

“This gives me a chance to study subjects I’m interested in,” Benjy said. “It also gets me ahead for the next school year.”

The difficulty of summer school classes vary, but Benjy said that he may pursue a college program, which he believes could be challenging.

In addition to science and math classes, some students are taking more uncommon classes. Junior Ruchie Bhardwaj plans to take sociology at West Valley.

“I wanted to do something during my summer, so I thought, ‘Why not?,’” Bhardwaj said. “Sociology seems really interesting. It’s something new, so I wanted to give it a try.”

Bhardwaj will be taking the class online, which she believes will make the experience unique from a normal semester-long or year-long class at the school.

“Hopefully it will be easier. I’m taking the class online, so it is definitely going to be different,” Bhardwaj said.

While there have not been any studies with evidence that summer school necessarily bolsters a college application, summer school does have the ability to raise a student’s GPA, which would help an application. Assistant principal Brian Safine said that more and more students have been coming to talk to him or the school counselors about summer school classes.

“Taking summer classes is always popular,” Safine said. “Students always come to ask me or one of the counselors about [taking summer classes].”

Safine attributed the increase of the summer school trend to a few different reasons.

“There are a few motivators for summer courses,” Safine said. “Years ago, there was competing interest for folks who were able to get a job, and now it’s very difficult to get summer jobs, so that opens up the possibility of summer school.

“Getting college credit is certainly a factor, so not just ‘looking good on a college resumé,’ because you can actually get college credit for summer courses,” Safine said.

Another popular reason for taking summer school classes is to knock out graduation requirements, such as Applied Arts classes. Sophomore Edward Yang, who will be taking Introduction to Business at West Valley, decided to do so almost solely for this reason.

“I’m taking the class so I don’t have to take an applied arts class at school,” Edward said. “I want to continue doing Jazz Band for all four years, and [Introduction to Business] was the only class that didn’t seem too boring.”

Like Bhardwaj, he does not expect the class to be particularly difficult.

“From what I hear, it’s not really difficult compared to normal school classes,” he said.

Edward and Bhardwaj reported that the application process was easy and they were confident that they would be accepted because they applied early. Getting into their respective programs was not difficult, they said.

Safine said that while there are several reasons to take courses over the summer, many students just do it to broaden their knowledge.

“It’s a way of being able to take something over the summer that we don’t offer here,” Safine said, “a way of expanding one’s academic horizons.”