Some summer education programs have wrapped up while others are in full swing as students throughout the county work through the break to make the grade.

“We’re just beginning the second half of summer school today,” Pike County High School Principal Mike Hall said Thursday.

The PCHS program will go through the end of July.

Hall said he likes to see small classrooms in the summer though and this marks the third consecutive year enrollment has dropped.

“Our numbers are down and those are numbers we like to keep down obviously.”

For the students who are attending, Hall said he is pleased about the method of their instruction.

“It’s all computer based,” he said of the curriculum run by the online learning program, ACCESS. “It’s very effective and very challenging as well, it really pushes the students.”

Goshen High School Counselor Buffy Lusk said her summer students are using ACCESS as well.

“I think it’s going real well,” she said.

Lusk said one of the advantages of the ACCESS program is that it allows different students with different trouble areas to all study in the same location under the same supervision.

“They are able to have one facilitator and they can take every class,” she said.

Lusk also said that seventh and eighth graders in Goshen have nearly completed their summer academics, while the high-schoolers will be working until the end of the month like their PCHS counterparts in Brundidge.

Troy City Schools are also using technology in their summer instruction.

Charles Henderson High School Vice Principal Byron Franklin said that CHHS is in its third year using ACCESS for summer school.

“Each year it’s getting better and we’re real pleased this summer,” Franklin said.“I think we’ve had about a 98 percent passage rate. That’s the best we’ve had in years.”

Like high schools in the Pike County system, CHHS has just reached its halfway point for summer school.

In only her eighth day on the job, Principal Kathy Murphy was already immersed in academic operations at CHHS. The new administrator said there are just over 30 students enrolled in the second summer semester.

Franklin said keeping that number to a minimum is a challenge due to requirements of TCS.

“Our standards are pretty high,” he said.

“Troy (City Schools) asks for 27 credits, while many schools only ask for 24.”

Franklin explained that the max a student can complete is 28 credits, which leaves a very small margin of error for TCS students.

“They (students in some other school systems) get four freebees, ours only get one.”

At Charles Henderson Middle School, the summer program ended in June. Former principal and now Administrative Assistant to the Superintendent Chresal Threadgill said he was pleased.

“We had close to 20 students learning a variety of subjects,” he said.

Threadgill said most of the students were able to make some good progress on math and reading skills.

“The students were very successful,” he said.