Serving students from Bridgeport, CT on the campus of Notre Dame High School

Our Results

The Horizons experience prepares students for what’s next.

Students’ reading and math skills improve significantly, and they return to their schools excited to learn. They graduate from high school and go on to college or other post-secondary training. Horizons students develop life skills like commitment, persistence, and the desire to contribute to their community. With the tools to navigate their world, Horizons students embrace a more expansive view of what’s possible, and find a path of success.

Evaluations consistently find that over one six-week summer session, Horizons students:

  • Improve social skills
  • Improve self-confidence and motivation
  • Have greater willingness to try new things
  • Improve school-year attendance
  • Develop greater interest in nutrition
  • Learn to swim
  • Have high satisfaction with the program

At Horizons, we capture a broad range of information and use that data for continuous improvement. Since 1995, Horizons National has worked closely with third-party evaluators and education data companies, including Yale University, Amplify, and Renaissance Learning, to assess the effectiveness of the program. Key findings demonstrate that Horizons students, who represent a broad range of learning styles and ability, achieve success in school and beyond:

  • Consistent gains of 8-12 weeks grade equivalence in reading and math over each 6-week summer session
  • High school graduation rate of (on average) 97%
  • Increased school attendance, and improved self-esteem

Horizons National recently engaged Concentric Research & Evaluation (CRE) for a comprehensive Retrospective Study, to determine whether students who participate in the Horizons program for at least four summers achieve better academic outcomes than similar students who do not participate. Read the promising results here.

Charts showing improved school attendance, positive changes in middle school math achievement, and positive changes in perception of academic self-confidence in Horizons students vs. a control group.