Friendship PCS, Washington Latin PCS, and KIPP DC PCS Graduation Rates Hit a New Record

With the City’s graduation rates being released quietly last week, we thought we would make a lot of noise touting the Class of 2013.  The 2013 4-year graduation rate for the public charter high school graduates is 79%, which exceeds the state’s rate of 64%. The District’s ultimate goal is to have 85% of students graduating by 2017. 

This is the third year the District has used the Adjusted Cohort Graduated Rate (ACGR), as required by the U.S. Department of Education. Unlike the previous graduation rate methodology, ACGR holds schools accountable for helping students progress from 9th grade to graduation on time, rather than just counting the number of students who drop out. The 19 charter schools’ ACGR rose by 2 points from 2012 to 2013.

This year’s noteworthy results:

• Special education students showed significant gains compared to the District rate – 59% of charter schools’ special education students graduated on time, compared to 44% citywide.
• 79% of Economically disadvantaged students graduated from public charter schools on time, compared to 59% citywide.
• 79% of African American and 70% of Latino students graduated on time, 17 and 7 points above the citywide average respectively.
• For the third year in a row (out of three years using ACGR), charter schools are the only non-selective schools ranked in the top 10 schools by ACGR. The non-selective schools with the highest graduation rates in 2013 were Washington Latin PCS, Friendship PCS – Collegiate Academy, KIPP DC – College Preparatory PCS, Washington Mathematics Science Technology (WMST) PCS, and SEED PCS. For all schools’ graduation rates, please click here.
• 1,022 students who started high school in 2009-2010 graduated from public charter high schools in 2013.

Graduation rate exceeds the state's rate by 20 points.