Students Take Trip To Rome While In Wake County

The students are taking part in Wake County Schools' first Voyager Summer Academy, which immerses students in the culture of a foreign country. They have spent one month "in" ancient Rome.

"How they talk and how they look, how their clothes are, what kind of food they have," student Marcella Gonzalez said.

Teacher Sarah Wallace said part of getting kids to concentrate in summer school is making learning fun. The program involves hands-on-projects and student performances.

"The first day they came in looking all sad, pouting they were here, but after the first day, they saw that it was fun. They were learning but having fun. They were ready to come back," she said.

Many of the 168 children in the program did poorly on their end-of-grade tests. The goal of the Voyager Academy is to help them pass the tests and succeed in the next grade.

"I think this is good to give them some confidence to know they can tackle that test with success because they're tackling things with success in here," Wallace said.

The students are repeating their end-of-grade tests this week. Wallace said she has high expectations from her students. She also said they have improved by an average of five points on the practice tests throughout the summer.