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June 61h, 2017 <br />The Mayor & City Council Members <br />City of Santa AWha <br />Santa Afma, CA <br />Honorable Mayor Miguel A. Pulido & City Council Members, <br />As elected members of our community, you bear the most direct responsibility to <br />improve the life of the citizens in our community. My name is Farooq Ansari, and I <br />am the President of Solving the Summer Learning Gap Club at Sage Hill School in <br />Newport Beach. Today, on behalf of our club, I will present to you the most <br />important problem that is impacting the K-12 education system in our community <br />and our country. The problem is "The Summer Learning Lag" or "The Summer <br />Slide". Summer learning lag refers to the loss of learning that takes place in children <br />from underprivileged families and the long-term impact of summer on their <br />educational outcomes. <br />The inspiration for founding this club came from reading the works of Malcolm <br />Gladwell. He is one of the most influential and powerful thinkers, journalists and <br />thought leaders on a variety of issues, including education. In his books, he <br />emphasizes the academic achievement gap between children of low socioeconomic <br />backgrounds and their peers from wealthier families. Through various research <br />endeavors and analysis of scientific studies, Gladwell and now a host of researchers <br />have concluded that there is a definite link between this achievement gap and what <br />happens during the summer. <br />So, what exactly is the summer learning gap? This term refers to how children from <br />low socioeconomic backgrounds fall behind academically during the summer, while <br />their middle- and upper-class peers continue to advance during the vacation. In fact, <br />summer learning loss accounts for 2/3 of the achievement gap by ninth grade. <br />Studies reveal that children from both wealthy and poor families progress at the <br />same rate academically during the school year, but the main discrepancy in <br />performance occurs during the summer. In fact, the child from a wealthier family <br />gains at least 2 months in math and reading during the summer, while the student <br />with fewer resources loses about 1 month. By the time both these students reach Sth <br />