Summer 2020
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Dear families,
We hope that you and your family are safe, our thoughts and prayers are with you. We thank you for all of your kind words and your support during this time.
Due to COVID-19 and the need for social distancing, we have shifted to offering virtual camps and courses instead of in-person camps this summer. These live, virtual, hands-on programs will be students who are rising 4th graders through high-school. Unfortunately, we are unable to offer virtual options for our youngest learners (1st-3rd grade). We have links and information below that explains refunds, selecting virtual courses/camps, and FAQs.
Although we will miss our in-person camps and our youngest students, we are excited about continuing to learn and interact!
Virtual Summer Programs (4th - High School)
We are happy to announce that we will be able to bring many programs to you virtually. We did have to change some camps or courses, or offer substitutions, and we hope you are excited about them.
Our summer programs that kids love will be virtual, led by great teachers and technology that works. Since we closed our physical building almost two months ago, we haven't missed a beat in school. We transitioned to virtual school starting on Monday, March 16 with a full-time, interactive, hands-on, learning environment that provided kids (and adults!) consistency and sense of normalcy. We thank our faculty, parents, and students for the flexibility, hard work, and support to make this a success! We successfully piloted a virtual spring break, which kids and families loved. We recognize that it's not the same as being together, but we have worked hard to make it as close to the experience as possible, including our virtual Science Fair. So, what does this mean for the summer?
What ages/grade levels?
We have excellent programming for students who are rising 4th graders through high-school.
Sadly, we are unable to offer virtual options for our youngest learners (1st-3rd grade). For our youngest friends, we haven't been able to figure out, yet, how to provide the quality programming that you know us for. We are working on an idea for 6-7 year olds. If you would be interested in the pilot program, please email jheitz@ideaventionsacademy.org.
What format? All-day? Half-day?
We will have half-day options and a few of full-day options. For most of our STEM camps and courses, we have changed them to shorter programs. This will give you the option of doing a morning session, an afternoon session, or both.
Many of our programs geared to middle and high school students, such as the literature, writing, and AP Computer Science courses, can continue as planned, and our teachers have had weeks of practice and success running the equivalent courses in our school this last month.
Our course sizes will be very small (10 students max) to allow individual interaction, led by excellent teachers, hands-on and engaging, and use proven Google Meet technology.
What is being offered?
You can view the offerings and their descriptions here:
What makes our programs different?
Well, like our core-philosophy of our in-person programs, they are small-group sessions. Teachers are there, engaging students in discussions and leading the kids through hands-on activities. Kids get the social interaction and mental stimulation through discussions and hands-on work that we are known for.
Who is teaching the courses?
Our Ideaventions Academy faculty that you love - Dr. Sarah, Ms. Emily, Mr. Ryan, Mr. Johnny, Mr. Andrew, Ms. Anne, Mr. Gardner, and Sra. Magnolia.
How can we help?
We had a great summer planned, and are preparing for a smaller summer than we have had. Having virtual courses allow us to reach students who we wouldn't otherwise be able to work with, especially for our literature classes. Please forward our information to your friends and families that are in other parts of the country.
How does materials pick up work?
During our spring break camps, we piloted driving materials to registered campers. Unfortunately, we realized that is not sustainable for us.
If your class requires lab materials, we will have scheduled materials pick up days at our school in Reston the Thursday and Friday before each camp starts from 4:30 pm - 6:30 pm. If you are not comfortable picking up materials and within a 15 mile radius of our school in Reston, we can deliver them for a $15 fee the Saturday before camp starts.
For the literature courses, for purposes of the discussion, we will provide a hard-copy book so that we are all working with the same edition. You are welcome to read it on your Kindle or electronic device, but we ask that you have a copy of the book for the discussion.
What is the timing?
As you can imagine, this will be a manual process that will take time to work through and expect to have completed processing refunds and changes within 4 weeks.
What technology do you use?
We use Google Meet for our course offerings. Please provide the email that your child will be using, as we invite them individually and admit them to the course.
How did Spring Break Camps go?
These are the comments we received from our Spring Break courses.
What do I do if I was previously registered for an in-person summer camps or courses?
How will billing work?
Who gets priority?
We will give priority for changes based on the week that you were registered for. However, if you would like to change to a different week, add a week or more, or cancel a week or more, please note that in the form. First priority will be given to children already registered for our camps, then to students from our school. Next Tuesday, May 5, we will open up our registrations to the broader public.
Thank you again and we hope to see you, virtually, this summer.
The Ideaventions Team
We hope that you and your family are safe, our thoughts and prayers are with you. We thank you for all of your kind words and your support during this time.
Due to COVID-19 and the need for social distancing, we have shifted to offering virtual camps and courses instead of in-person camps this summer. These live, virtual, hands-on programs will be students who are rising 4th graders through high-school. Unfortunately, we are unable to offer virtual options for our youngest learners (1st-3rd grade). We have links and information below that explains refunds, selecting virtual courses/camps, and FAQs.
Although we will miss our in-person camps and our youngest students, we are excited about continuing to learn and interact!
Virtual Summer Programs (4th - High School)
We are happy to announce that we will be able to bring many programs to you virtually. We did have to change some camps or courses, or offer substitutions, and we hope you are excited about them.
Our summer programs that kids love will be virtual, led by great teachers and technology that works. Since we closed our physical building almost two months ago, we haven't missed a beat in school. We transitioned to virtual school starting on Monday, March 16 with a full-time, interactive, hands-on, learning environment that provided kids (and adults!) consistency and sense of normalcy. We thank our faculty, parents, and students for the flexibility, hard work, and support to make this a success! We successfully piloted a virtual spring break, which kids and families loved. We recognize that it's not the same as being together, but we have worked hard to make it as close to the experience as possible, including our virtual Science Fair. So, what does this mean for the summer?
What ages/grade levels?
We have excellent programming for students who are rising 4th graders through high-school.
Sadly, we are unable to offer virtual options for our youngest learners (1st-3rd grade). For our youngest friends, we haven't been able to figure out, yet, how to provide the quality programming that you know us for. We are working on an idea for 6-7 year olds. If you would be interested in the pilot program, please email jheitz@ideaventionsacademy.org.
What format? All-day? Half-day?
We will have half-day options and a few of full-day options. For most of our STEM camps and courses, we have changed them to shorter programs. This will give you the option of doing a morning session, an afternoon session, or both.
Many of our programs geared to middle and high school students, such as the literature, writing, and AP Computer Science courses, can continue as planned, and our teachers have had weeks of practice and success running the equivalent courses in our school this last month.
Our course sizes will be very small (10 students max) to allow individual interaction, led by excellent teachers, hands-on and engaging, and use proven Google Meet technology.
What is being offered?
You can view the offerings and their descriptions here:
- Elementary (rising 4th-6th grade)
- Middle School and High School
- High-School Courses for Credit and Getting Ready for College
- Credit-Bearing High-School Courses
- College Essays and Portfolios (rising 12th graders)
What makes our programs different?
Well, like our core-philosophy of our in-person programs, they are small-group sessions. Teachers are there, engaging students in discussions and leading the kids through hands-on activities. Kids get the social interaction and mental stimulation through discussions and hands-on work that we are known for.
Who is teaching the courses?
Our Ideaventions Academy faculty that you love - Dr. Sarah, Ms. Emily, Mr. Ryan, Mr. Johnny, Mr. Andrew, Ms. Anne, Mr. Gardner, and Sra. Magnolia.
How can we help?
We had a great summer planned, and are preparing for a smaller summer than we have had. Having virtual courses allow us to reach students who we wouldn't otherwise be able to work with, especially for our literature classes. Please forward our information to your friends and families that are in other parts of the country.
How does materials pick up work?
During our spring break camps, we piloted driving materials to registered campers. Unfortunately, we realized that is not sustainable for us.
If your class requires lab materials, we will have scheduled materials pick up days at our school in Reston the Thursday and Friday before each camp starts from 4:30 pm - 6:30 pm. If you are not comfortable picking up materials and within a 15 mile radius of our school in Reston, we can deliver them for a $15 fee the Saturday before camp starts.
For the literature courses, for purposes of the discussion, we will provide a hard-copy book so that we are all working with the same edition. You are welcome to read it on your Kindle or electronic device, but we ask that you have a copy of the book for the discussion.
What is the timing?
As you can imagine, this will be a manual process that will take time to work through and expect to have completed processing refunds and changes within 4 weeks.
What technology do you use?
We use Google Meet for our course offerings. Please provide the email that your child will be using, as we invite them individually and admit them to the course.
How did Spring Break Camps go?
These are the comments we received from our Spring Break courses.
- "Thank you so much Mr. Andrew for the wonderful camp. As you said, writing in twenty minute sessions was so much better than just sitting down for two hours. I think that that was the best camp I've ever been to, mostly because of how good of a teacher you were." - Elementary Student in Literature Alive
- "Would like to thank Mr. Andrew for teaching - our child really was engaged and is now talking about writing more stories on his own" - Elementary Parent in Literature Alive
- "This is the funniest and best camp I have ever been to!" - Middle School Student in Literature Alive
- "Thanks so much! [My child] really enjoyed this camp and was eager to share the updates to his story each day. It was nice for him to have something fun and creative to focus on this week." - Middle School Parent in Literature Alive
- "My boys absolutely loved your class and can't wait to take another one!" - High School Parent in Literature Alive
- "THANK YOU Sarah for a great camp!!!! [My child] just said “it was awesome”….which coming from a 10 year old is fantastic! :) She especially loved the meringue lesson!" - Elementary Parent in Science@Home
- "Thanks so much for all the feedback this week. [My child] really seemed to enjoy the camp and always had so much to share afterwards." - Elementary Parent in Science@Home
What do I do if I was previously registered for an in-person summer camps or courses?
- If your child is one of our youngest students (6 years old to 8 1/2 during the summer), we will be processing full refunds, including the deposit.
- If your child is signed up for high-school courses only, we already reached out to you if there was a change in programming. If we didn't, it means that the program will run as planned.
- If your child is 8 1/2 and older as of the day of the start of camp, we are assuming that they are a rising 4th grader, please fill out the appropriate form (below) by Monday, May 4, for us to be able to process changes to your registration. You can select to enroll in virtual offerings or request a refund. We have limited virtual spots and want to give all current registrants first priority:
- Elementary Form:
- Form for children 8 1/2 and older and registered in Elementary STEM Camp
- Middle and High School Form:
- Form for children registered in Middle School and High School STEM Programs
- Elementary Form:
- The cost of each half-day camp is $225 for all elementary camps. Cost of Middle and High School programs vary and the cost can be found at this page or in the change form.
- If you signed up for any before care or after care, we will be processing full refunds for these, or applying what you paid for these against the balance due if you decide to transfer to a new camp and still have a balance.
How will billing work?
- If you are cancelling, we will refund what you have paid in full.
- If your new amount due is less than what you have already paid (including deposits), we will refund you the difference.
- If you have only paid deposits and the amount due is more than what you have paid, we will apply the deposits in their entirety to the new registrations, and invoice you for the difference.
- If you had an early-bird discount and only sign up for one half-day session, the discount will be prorated.
Who gets priority?
We will give priority for changes based on the week that you were registered for. However, if you would like to change to a different week, add a week or more, or cancel a week or more, please note that in the form. First priority will be given to children already registered for our camps, then to students from our school. Next Tuesday, May 5, we will open up our registrations to the broader public.
Thank you again and we hope to see you, virtually, this summer.
The Ideaventions Team
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