Last year, all summer school classes took place virtually, but this year several classes will be in-person, some even with a hybrid schedule. 

Mr. Bill Peebles ‘88, summer school administrator and admission liaison, said that physical education, health and ceramics will be in person; debate and government will be hybrid and speech, Spanish, economy and Latin III will be entirely online.

Peebles added that journalism and composition were also offered as summer class options but currently do not have enough students enrolled. “We’re hoping we can get a couple more kids in those courses so we can have the classes,” Peebles said. He added that composition would be online and journalism would be in person if the classes do reach a full enrollment. 

After last year’s atypical summer school structure due to safety precautions surrounding the Covid-19 outbreak, Peebles said, “We hope to get a little closer back to normal, especially with our PE and health classes. Obviously, we’re still in a situation where students opt to go online and we’ll respect that decision, but we’re hoping that as many of the students are (in-person) as possible.”

Peebles added that the administrators followed all of the Covid-19 guidelines for social distancing when forming the in-person classes.

While there are a few summer courses that are available live and in person, Peebles said that many classes that are designed more for upperclassmen are taking on a virtual format, either online or hybrid. “I think our older kids are going to like the flexibility of our online options — they’re not going to have to be here at school every day, they can do it from home, they can do it on the back porch or wherever,” Peebles said. 

This is Peebles’s second year serving as the summer school administrator and he said that summer school enrollment definitely increased from last year. “We’re offering more classes this year than we ever have,” Peebles said. 

Because last year forced summer classes to take place online, Peebles said he thinks this could have affected the enrollment size in 2020. “I think some people did not want the online option, even though some people like the online summer school better. But I think for a lot of our incoming freshmen, the summer school experiment is as much social as it is academic, and so that probably hurt our numbers a little bit.”

As class options and formats vary, Peebles gave advice for students who will take a summer school class. He said, “Make sure (you) know teachers’ expectations and to follow those expectations.”