Today we released our annual school quality rankings. Overall the quality of public charter schools continues to rise, and more students are enrolled at a top-rated school.
The Report measures public charter school performance with a single score between 1 and 100 based on a range of categories.
For pre-kindergarten (PK) through grade 12, the report is divided into the following categories:
Additionally, students in 3rd grade, middle and high school have grade-specific measures:
Here are the 2018 Report highlights based on the categories and grade-specific measures:
Overall
- BASIS DC PCS (High School) (located in Ward 2) earned the highest School Quality Report score for the third consecutive year with 97.3% on the high school framework.
- Rocketship PCS-Legacy Prep (located in Ward 7) has the highest score at 94.6% for the PK-8 framework. This is the highest score of any first-year school. (As a first-year school, Rocketship PCS - Legacy Prep did not receive a Tier.)
- Washington Yu Ying PCS (located in Ward 5) has the second highest score at 93.8% for the PK-8 framework, improving by 7.8 percentage points from last year.
- Cedar Tree Academy PCS (located in Ward 8) has the third highest score with 89.4% on the PK-8 framework and earned Tier 1 status for the third consecutive year.
- The percent of 9th grade students on track to graduate from high school has improved each year for the past four years, increasing from 73.4% in SY 2014-15 to 86.2% in SY 2017-18.
- On the PARCC assessment, the proficiency rate for at-risk public charter students improved on both ELA by 2.1 percentage points and for homeless students in math by 1.2 percentage points.
Most Improved Schools
- Up 23.4 points, Friendship PCS - Technology Preparatory High School (located in Ward 8) earned a Tier 1 ranking.
- Up 20.2 points, Friendship PCS - Woodridge International Middle (located in Ward 5) went from scoring 54.4% last year to 74.7% this year.
- Up 18.9 points, Shining Stars Montessori Academy PCS (located in Ward 5) went from scoring 44.4% last year to 63.3% this year.
- Up 18.3 points, Capital City PCS - High School (located in Ward 4) continues to improve its performance.
- Improving its tier ranking from Tier 3 to Tier 2, Achievement Preparatory Academy PCS - Wahler Place Elementary School (located in Ward 8) increased its performance by 14.3 points.
Student Progress
- Friendship PCS-Woodridge International Middle (located in Ward 5) and Meridian PCS (located in Ward 1) made gains of five or more points in both ELA and math median growth percentile (MGP).
- Meridian PCS (located in Ward 1) and Washington Yu Ying PCS (located in Ward 5) are the only schools to see increases in both ELA and math for every year of the PARCC.
Parent Satisfaction
- The re-enrollment rate for DC’s public charter school sector, a key School Quality Report measure of family satisfaction, improved to 84.3%
- Students with disabilities are re-enrolling at a rate of 84.8%
- Six public charter schools have double-digit re-enrollment rate gains:
- Roots PCS: + 20.2% to 81.1%
- Bridges PCS: + 19.6% to 87.0%
- Perry Street Preparatory PCS: + 16.9% to 85.3%
- Shining Stars Montessori Academy PCS: + 11.3% to 80.3%
- Center City PCS - Capitol Hill: + 11.1% to 80.3%
- Achievement Preparatory Academy PCS-Wahler Place Elementary School: + 10.1% to 76.3%
Student Achievement
- Capital City PCS-Lower School (located in Ward 4) improved in PARCC proficiency for the third consecutive year in both ELA and math, making it the only PK-8 public charter school to grow in both ELA and math each year since DC students began taking the PARCC assessment in SY 2014-15.
- At Inspired Teaching Demonstration PCS (located in Ward 5), two-thirds of its returning third graders are scoring proficient (double the proficiency rate for PARCC ELA students citywide).
- At Center City PCS - Petworth (located in Ward 4), proficiency rates for returning third grade students improved by nearly 30% from SY 2016-17
Attendance
- The following schools had the highest in-seat attendance rates in the public charter school sector:
Top Five: In-Seat Attendance Rates for PK - 8 Public Charter Schools
Top Five: In-Seat Attendance Rates for Public Charter High Schools
Middle Schools
- The top five middle schools with the largest percentage of 8th graders scoring College and Career Ready on PARCC are:
High Schools
- For the first time, the School Quality Report measured college readiness in each subject on the SAT /ACT. On these measures, 35.1% of 12th grade public charter school students scored college ready in Evidence-Based Reading and Writing (EBRW) and 17.3% in Math, including three schools with greater than 50% of EBRW demonstrating college readiness:
- Washington Latin PCS-Upper School: 81.0%
- Thurgood Marshall Academy PCS: 59.7%
- SEED PCS of Washington, DC: 50.0%
- Two growing schools, Washington Leadership Academy PCS (located in Ward 5) scoring 84.8% and District of Columbia International School (located in Ward 4) scoring 77.3%, earned Tier 1 on the School Quality Report for the first time in SY 2017-18.
- BASIS DC PCS - High School (located in Ward 2) topped its own record for the highest ever School Quality Report score for the third consecutive year, scoring 97.3%.
- Thurgood Marshall Academy PCS (located in Ward 8) is among the top 5 high schools in 10 different School Quality Report measures.
- For the first time since transitioning to PARCC, the School Quality Report measured growth percentiles for high school students on the state assessment.
- Geometry students at public charter high schools had a median growth percentile (MGP) of 50 and at-risk MGP of 49, indicating that at-risk students are growing at a comparable rate to general education students both across the sector and across the PARCC consortium.
- Every public charter high school had a College Acceptance rate of at least 93% or greater.
For more information about the ratings click here, for Alternative schools click here and for Adult schools, click here.