1. Urban Charter Schools Impact in Washington DC March 2015

2. Notice
This presentation contains interactive graphics which should be viewed in the context of a powerpoint presentation. Viewing presentation as static slides will cause some data to be hidden from the viewer and may cause labels to appear with the wrong graph.

3. Impact Research Questions
This impact study answers the following questions:
How does the academic progress of charter school students compare to their traditional public school (TPS) counterparts in Washington DC? We examine:
Total average academic growth for all charter students relative to TPS
Average academic growth for charter school students for separate time periods
Charter school student growth by elementary / middle / high school grade levels
Charter school student growth by prior year academic achievement
Charter school student growth by the major student subgroups
Charter school student growth by the number of years student continuously attended charter schools
For the group of charter schools in Washington DC, how do they perform compared to their peer schools in the same community?

4. A Quick Word About Methods
Charter school students may be different than a typical student in TPS, so care is needed in testing their learning gains. We use a “Virtual Twin” approach to match each charter school’s students to TPS students who look just like them drawn from the TPS schools that have lost students to the charter school. A Technical Appendix provides a full explanation of our research methodology.

5. A Quick Word About Methods
Unlike other recent CREDO studies, this study does not include a conversion of effect sizes to days of learning. As the days of learning computation is based on the national NAEP scores, it would not be appropriate to apply it to the limited regional samples which almost certainly DO NOT progress at the same rate as the national population.

6. Understanding the Slides
Average Academic Growth for Charter School students relative to performance of Virtual Twins in Traditional Public Schools in Urban Region–
There are two growth values for reading. The left is for TPS students and the right for Charter students
There are also two growth values for math. As before, the left is for TPS students and the right for Charter students
These are the marginal effects of charter enrollment. The left is for reading and the right for math.
This graph looks at the difference between the charter and TPS growth values.
0.03
– 0.08
- 0.05
-0.01
– 0.05
- 0.06
Average TPS Growth
Average TPS Growth
To compute the difference, we take the Charter growth value minus the TPS growth value for each subject.

7. WASHINGTON DC Results

8. Student-Level Results
Average Academic Growth for Charter School students relative to performance of Virtual Twins in Traditional Public Schools in Washington DC– ALL STUDENTS
Average TPS Growth
Average TPS Growth

9. Student-Level Results
Average Academic Growth for Charter School students relative to performance of Virtual Twins in Traditional Public Schools in Washington DC– ALL STUDENTS by Growth Period
Average TPS Growth

10. Student-Level Results
Average Academic Growth for Charter School students relative to performance of Virtual Twins in Traditional Public Schools in Washington DC– ALL STUDENTS by Gradespan
Average Elementary TPS Growth

11. Student-Level Results
Average Academic Growth for Charter School students relative to performance of Virtual Twins in Traditional Public Schools in Washington DC–
ALL STUDENTS by Years of Charter School Enrollment
Average TPS Growth
This analysis includes only students who entered a charter school after

12. Student-Level Results
Average Academic Growth for Charter School students relative to performance of Virtual Twins in Traditional Public Schools in Washington DC–
ALL WHITE STUDENTS
Average White TPS Growth
Average White TPS Growth

13. Student-Level Results
Average Academic Growth for Charter School students relative to performance of Virtual Twins in Traditional Public Schools in Washington DC–
ALL ASIAN STUDENTS
Average White TPS Growth
Average Asian TPS Growth

14. Student-Level Results
Average Academic Growth for Charter School students relative to performance of Virtual Twins in Traditional Public Schools in Washington DC–
ALL NATIVE AMERICAN STUDENTS
Average White TPS Growth
Average Native American TPS Growth
‡ There were not enough Washington DC Native American students in Reading or Math to compute an effect size.

15. Student-Level Results
Average Academic Growth for Charter School students relative to performance of Virtual Twins in Traditional Public Schools in Washington DC–
ALL BLACK STUDENTS
Average White TPS Growth
Average Black TPS Growth

16. Student-Level Results
Average Academic Growth for Charter School students relative to performance of Virtual Twins in Traditional Public Schools in Washington DC–
ALL HISPANIC STUDENTS
Average White TPS Growth
Average Hispanic TPS Growth

17. Student-Level Results
Average Academic Growth for Charter School students relative to performance of Virtual Twins in Traditional Public Schools in Washington DC–
ALL STUDENTS ELIGIBLE FOR FREE / REDUCED PRICE LUNCH
Average Non-Poverty TPS Growth
Average TPS in Poverty Growth

18. Student-Level Results
Average Academic Growth for Charter School students relative to performance of Virtual Twins in Traditional Public Schools in Washington DC–
ALL BLACK STUDENTS in POVERTY
Average White, Non-Poverty TPS Growth

19. Student-Level Results
Average Academic Growth for Charter School students relative to performance of Virtual Twins in Traditional Public Schools in Washington DC–
ALL HISPANIC STUDENTS in POVERTY
Average White Non-Poverty TPS Growth

20. Student-Level Results
Average Academic Growth for Charter School students relative to performance of Virtual Twins in Traditional Public Schools in Washington DC–
ALL ENGLISH LANGUAGE LEARNERS
Average Non-ELL TPS Growth
Average ELL TPS Growth

21. Student-Level Results
Average Academic Growth for Charter School students relative to performance of Virtual Twins in Traditional Public Schools in Washington DC–
ALL STUDENTS with SPECIAL EDUCATION NEEDS
Average Non-SPED TPS Growth
Average SPED TPS Growth

22. Student-Level Results
Average Academic Growth for Charter School students relative to performance of Virtual Twins in Traditional Public Schools in Washington DC–
ALL STUDENTS WHO WERE RETAINED IN PRIOR YEAR
Average Non-Retained TPS Growth
Average Retained TPS Growth