The first experiment has come and gone, and we might not know for months or even years if it worked.

But on its face, the Vicksburg Warren School District’s plan to “save” children at risk of missing out on educational basics is a step in the right direction.

The district’s first “intercession week” ended Friday. About 600 of the nearly 9,200 students districtwide were urged or directed by their teachers and principals to participate.

The work was remedial, a review of what had been taught during the first nine weeks in math or reading — the most basic courses. The ratio of teachers to students was about a third of numbers in the regular classrooms.

Granted, not every student in this district or any other can be expected to be a brain surgeon or a nuclear physicist or seek any other top-intelligence position, but they all need and should have the basics. That’s what school district officials have said the “intercession weeks” are all about — giving children a chance.

The subject matter and the way it was taught should lend to these children the bootstraps they need to pick up to a higher level, on a higher plane than a week earlier.

It also should turn on the lights in their heads, you know the ones we all carry, the ones that snap on when we feel enlightened or that we, too, can learn.

In turn, the students then can feel pride — pride in their work, pride in their abilities and, generally, pride in learning.

For what more could any parent or educator ask?