In his summer 2019 essay “Is Summer Learning Loss Real?,” Paul von Hippel tells us that his belief in summer slide – the pattern that has low-income and disadvantaged minority youth losing ground academically to their more advantaged peers over the long summer break — “has been shaken.” Von Hippel is a respected education researcher whom I hold in high regard, but I do not share his position on summer learning loss. This rejoinder explains why.

Two considerations appear to weigh on von Hippel. The first is that results from the Baltimore-based Beginning School Study, which he cites as one of best-known and most influential studies of summer learning loss, are not sustained when evaluated using recent advances in the psychometrics of achievement testing. The second is evidence that achievement gaps across social lines originate substantially over the preschool years, not during the summer months (or once children are in school, for that matter).

Karl Alexander is John Dewey Professor Emeritus of Sociology at Johns Hopkins University and was co-director of the Beginning School Study. He is a board member of the National Summer Learning Association.

Paul T. von Hippel responds to this piece in “Summer Learning: Key Findings Fail to Replicate, but Programs Still Have Promise.”