Hundreds of educators, nonprofit professionals, business partners, philanthropists, policymakers and government leaders filled the Spartanburg Marriott this week for Thrive 2026, a conference built around a simple but stubborn idea: good grades alone aren't enough to guarantee a child's future. The event was hosted by the Spartanburg Academic Movement, known locally as SAM, and organized around the theme of social capital and human connection in helping students succeed.
According to FOX Carolina, academic leaders at the conference said strong grades help put students on a path to success, but research presented at the event suggests students need strengths beyond academics to reach their full potential. That framing shaped much of the programming, which drew on nationally known experts, including a Harvard University economics professor, alongside community leaders and authors. Per learnwithsam.org, the gathering brought together educators, practitioners, nonprofit professionals, business partners, philanthropists, policymakers and government leaders in Spartanburg, South Carolina.
Chetty and National Voices Headline the Agenda
Harvard economist and Opportunity Insights director Raj Chetty delivered the opening keynote, according to the same event listing. The schedule also pointed to sessions from Christian Rhodes of Harlem Children's Zone, Julia Freeland Fisher of the Clayton Christensen Institute, and Lisa M. Lawson of the Annie E. Casey Foundation, according to the organization's conference page, though that lineup detail carries medium confidence in the available materials. Freeland Fisher's session, titled The Missing Metric: Why Connection Matters for Students, dug into why social capital and relationship-building matter as much as curriculum when it comes to education innovation.
The conference's broader focus on connection and opportunity reflects SAM's work identifying and closing achievement gaps and connecting students with mentors. The organization has tracked Spartanburg County academic achievement data, and that dataset gives some texture to how far the county has come — and how far it still has to go.
Test Scores Rise, but Gaps Persist
The numbers tell a mixed story. Spartanburg County elementary schools hit 55.4 percent proficiency in English language arts for grades 3-5 in 2023, nearly five percentage points higher than the year before and just above the statewide average of 55.2 percent. Third-grade ELA proficiency climbed from 49.4 percent in 2022 to 51.9 percent in 2023, though that still trailed the state average of 53.4 percent, both figures reported on the same organizational page.
Progress has been sharpest at schools serving the county's poorest students. Four Spartanburg elementary schools with the highest poverty ratings saw their collective third-grade ELA proficiency jump from just 14.7 percent in 2017 to 33.3 percent in 2023. Middle schoolers also inched forward, with grades 6-8 math proficiency rising from 35.9 percent in 2022 to 36.2 percent in 2023, edging past the state average of 33.0 percent.
Even with those gains, racial disparities remain wide. The 2023 data showed a 36-percentage-point proficiency gap between white students and Black or African American students in ELA, and a 41-percentage-point gap between white and Hispanic students — numbers that underscore why conference organizers framed mentorship and relationship-building as tools for closing those divides, not just test prep.
Scholarships and Reengagement Push Students Past High School
Beyond the classroom, Spartanburg's broader strategy leans on postsecondary access. Through Movement 2030, SAM and more than 30 partners are aiming for 70 percent of high school graduates to enroll in postsecondary education and for 1,000 additional degrees and credentials to be completed every year by 2030, according to strivetogether.org. SAM's work, per that account, involves aligning education, business and community partners to expand access to postsecondary credentials and economic mobility across the county.
Spartanburg Community College's dual enrollment is growing, the same report noted, giving more high schoolers a head start on college credit. The Re: Degree initiative, meanwhile, has reengaged more than 1,200 adults who had some college experience but never finished a degree — a population often left out of traditional K-12 achievement conversations.
Taken together, the data and the initiatives highlighted at Thrive 2026 point to a county still working through entrenched gaps even as individual metrics inch upward. The agenda included reflection and action sessions.
