The Office of the Deputy Mayor for Education is pleased to introduce Inside DC Education — our new blog featuring stories, updates, and perspectives from across the District’s education continuum, from early childhood to career pathways.

We’ll take you behind the scenes to highlight the people, partnerships, and progress shaping the future of education in Washington, DC. You’ll hear directly from the Deputy Mayor for Education and our partners on how we’re working together to make sure every student in DC can learn, grow, and thrive.

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Public Charter Closures in the District over the past 12 years

March 2, 2026 by Rebecca Lee and Jennifer Comey, Planning and Analysis | [email protected]

This year marks the 30th anniversary of the District of Columbia School Reform Act of 1995 (SRA), which established the DC Public Charter School Board (DC PCSB) and led to the opening of the first public charter schools in the District. In exchange for greater autonomy, innovation, and flexibility, public  charter schools must meet performance goals outlined in their charter agreements (a contract between DC PCSB and the school’s trustees) or face potential closure.

This blog examines the landscape of public charter school closures over the past 12 years: how many schools have closed, why they closed, and when school communities were informed.¹ 

DC PCSB authorization and review of public charter schools
DC PCSB, an independent government agency in the District, authorizes the opening of public charter schools, granting a 15-year term for each charter. The SRA requires DC PCSB to conduct a review of each charter school² at least once every five years following its opening. If a charter school wishes to continue operating after 15 years, it must submit a renewal application requesting another 15-year term. Reviews evaluate:

• Progress toward charter goals,
• Academic achievement,
• Legal and financial compliance to applicable laws, and
• Governance quality.

These reviews and renewals provide predictable checkpoints for DC PCSB to assess a school’s progress. Based on these reviews, DC PCSB may:

• Allow a school to continue with or without conditions,
• Approve renewal for another 15-year term, or
• Revoke the charter, resulting in closure.

Schools may also close voluntarily due to decisions by their board of trustees sometimes in response to review findings, financial reasons, or for other matters. For more information, see the SRA and DC PCSB’s explainers.

No two closures are exactly alike, and the process may involve many steps. Below, we describe the scope and timing of public charter school closures over the past 12 years, using our best judgment to identify when school communities were likely informed, which includes public notification of a charter relinquishment or the public notification of a revocation.³ These dates may vary depending on the closure mechanism and cause(s).

20% of all public charter schools closed in the last 12 years
Between SY2013-14 and SY2024-25, 34 public charter schools closed, representing 20% of all public charter schools operating during that timeframe. Two-thirds of these were full local education agency (LEA) closures (22 schools), and one-third were partial LEA closures (11 schools), meaning other schools within the LEA continued to operate. Additionally, seven schools had phased closures, progressively closing one grade each year until the final grade closed. One closure was a placement-based school (Maya Angelou PCS – Academy at DC Jail).

These 34 closed schools had a combined 9,875 students enrolled as of their last enrollment audit, representing 1.9% of charter school enrollment over that timeframe.

70% of public charter closures were announced at least a month before the lottery deadline
While school closures are a necessary component of the public charter school model, they are destabilizing and often disruptive for communities, especially when they occur late in the school year after the My School DC common lottery deadline.

The best-case scenario is when families are informed that their school is undergoing a charter review or renewal process (which lasts more than one year), and closure decisions are communicated with sufficient time for families to plan for their next school, including participating in My School DC.

Among the 34 public charter school closures since SY2013-14:

• 23 closures were announced prior to the relevant lottery deadline,
• 10 closures were announced within a week of or after the lottery deadline,
• 1 closure was not applicable (Maya Angelou PCS - Academy at DC Jail, a placement-based school).

Figure 1: Closures by timing relative to first relevant lottery deadline, SY2013-14 to SY2024-25

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Table 1 lists the individual public charter schools that closed within a week of or after the My School DC lottery deadline. It includes their final operating school year, number of days between public notice of relinquishment or revocation and the lottery deadline, reasons for closure, and the number of students impacted.

Of the 10 closures announced near or after the lottery deadline, five closed primarily due to academic reasons and five closed due to financial/enrollment reasons. Only four of the 10 occurred during a DC PCSB renewal or review process; three of the four charter school boards voted to relinquish their charter.

Table 1: Closures within a week of or after lottery deadline, SY2013-14 to SY2024-25

Large docket of public charter school reviews and renewals in SY2024-25 and SY2025-26
In SY2024-25, DC PCSB conducted 20 public charter school reviews and renewals, resulting in:

• Eleven reviews leading to continuances without conditions, meaning the public charter school has another five years before the next anticipated DC PCSB review;
• Seven reviews leading to continuances with conditions, meaning the DC PCSB will review the status of the school’s progress in meeting the conditions in SY25-26 (3 of which could result in closure at the end of SY2025-26).
• Two schools relinquishing their charters after the lottery deadline in response to proposed or imposed conditions for continuance (I Dream PCS and Hope PCS-Tolson, listed in Table 1).

There are 16 public charter schools up for review or renewal in SY2025-26. This year, DC PCSB implemented several changes to accelerate review and renewal decisions, including holding earlier pre-meetings with schools and publishing preliminary charter-specific school evaluation reports sooner.

The DME will continue to add to the longitudinal dataset found in EdScape’s School Opening and Closing Trends to track the timing of relinquishment or revocation decisions. More information about the DC PCSB review/renewal schedule is available on their website.

Resources

• For ongoing updates visit EdScape’s School Openings and Closings page.
• Appendix: Table of 34 closures between SY13-14 and SY24-25 (xlsx)

Notes

¹ The timeframe starts with SY2013-14 instead of SY2012-13 (provided in EdScape) because student data are available from SY2013-14 on.

² A “school” in this context refers to a local education agency (LEA). Some charter “schools” are single-campus LEAs (e.g., DC Bilingual PCS) while others are multi-campus LEAs (e.g., KIPP DC PCS).

³ Public notification ranges from the DC PCSB including the relinquishment or revocation in their public record to the school’s board publicly notifying families.

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Where do students enrolled at closing public charter schools enroll the next school year?

March 2, 2026 by Rebecca Lee and Jennifer Comey, Planning and Analysis | [email protected]

This post examines where students from closing public charter schools enrolled the following year by sector, type of school (including takeover schools), and timing of the announcement. This analysis helps show how families navigate their school options when a public charter school closes, offering insight into the ways families exercise choice across the District’s public education landscape. Understanding these patterns supports efforts to ensure families have the timely information needed to make fully informed decisions about their next school.

All analysis compares enrollment as of the official audit, typically October 5, to the official audit the following year. The analysis starts from the first year of available student data, SY2013-14, and ends with the latest audited enrollment, SY2024-25. We are unable to include earlier closures such as the 42 District of Columbia Public Schools (DCPS) or 23 public charter schools that closed between 2008 and 2012 because student records are unavailable. One DCPS school closed during the time period analyzed here, which is excluded for simplicity.¹ For more information about openings and closing during the timeframe, see EdScape's School Opening and Closing Trends.

Approximately 7,900 public charter students needed to find a new school for the following year due to school closure.
The closures described below affected nearly 7,900 students who needed to select a new school, underscoring how essential it is that families are informed of school closures with enough time to make decisions about the full range of public school options available to them. Between SY2013-14 and SY2024-25, 34 public charter schools closed with 9,869 students enrolled as of their last enrollment audit, representing 1.9% of charter school enrollment over that timeframe. Excluding the students enrolled in the last or terminal grade of the school, 7,879 students needed to find a new school to attend the following year due to the closure.² Unless noted otherwise, the remainder of this analysis excludes students enrolled in the terminal grade of the closed school, as they already planned to attend their next grade at another school.

A slim majority (52%) of students from closed public charter schools enrolled in the public charter sector the following year.
A little more than half of the students from closed schools (52% or 4,120 students) remained in the public charter sector the following year. Almost one-third (31%) enrolled in DCPS schools and 15% left the public school system (not enrolled in either DCPS or public charters) as of the following October (see Figure 1).

Figure 1: Where students from 34 closed public charter schools enrolled the next year, by sector SY2013-14 through SY2024-25

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Note: The OSSE-managed category refers to Hospitality HS that was briefly managed by OSSE following the closure of Hospitality PCS after SY13-14.

Focusing on just the students who enrolled in DCPS schools, more students enrolled in an out-of-boundary DCPS school³  (41% of the 3,759 students not at charter schools) than at their in-boundary DCPS school (24%).

Among the 1,206 students who were not in the following audit (meaning not enrolled at DCPS or public charter school), most (897) did not return to the Washington, DC public school system during the analytic timeframe (SY2014-15 to SY2024-25), while 309 students appeared in an enrollment audit two or more years after their school closed.

When public charter students learn of closures close to or after the lottery deadline, they are less likely to stay in the public charter sector and more likely to leave the public school system.
Timely communication is essential for families to plan for the upcoming school year and apply to the My School DC lottery should they choose to. Only 39% of public charter students remain in the public charter sector if their school closure was announced close to or after the My School DC lottery deadline (referred to as “late closures”) as compared to the 55% of those who had earlier notice of their school’s closure (see Figure 2). The share enrolling after closure at DCPS schools is about the same regardless of the timing of the closure announcement (33% for late closures versus 31% for earlier notice). A far greater share of students is not enrolled in the public school system (neither a DCPS nor public charter school) the following year in cases of late closures (21%) as compared to timely notice of closures (14%).

Figure 2: Where students from closed public charter schools enrolled the next year, by late closures and not late closures SY2013-14 to SY2024-25

Note: There were 10 schools that met the late closure criteria and 24 that did not. See the DME’s public charter closure blog for more details.

More than half of students from closing public charter schools with a takeover option enrolled at the takeover school; slightly more did so when the lottery deadline had passed.
Takeover schools can provide families with continuity, but they also work best when families understand both the takeover option and other school alternatives. Takeover schools assume the closed school’s students and physical assets; students from the closed school are not required to submit a My School DC lottery application to attend. During the timeframe analyzed, there were 13 takeovers: 10 by public charter schools, two by DCPS schools, and one by OSSE (this school subsequently closed the following year with no takeover). More than half (57%) of the 4,609 students in the closing public charter schools with a public charter, DCPS, or OSSE-managed takeover option enrolled at the takeover option.

The share was similar among the 3,296 students with a public charter takeover option: 57% or 1,883 enrolled in the takeover, 14% enrolled in a different public charter school, 14% enrolled in a DCPS school, and 14% were not enrolled next year per the enrollment audit.⁴

This average across the 10 takeovers by public charter schools includes a wide range: from a low of 32% of former City Arts and Prep PCS students enrolling at Friendship PCS⁵ to a high of 73% of former Options PCS students enrolling at Kingsman Academy PCS the following year.

Two closed public charter schools were assumed by DCPS the following year, Community Academy AMOS I/Burdick to Dorothy Height ES and Excel PCS to Excel Academy. The average share of students who enrolled at these two absorbing schools was similar at 58%, with 61% continuing to Dorothy Height ES and 55% continuing to Excel Academy.

Students from closed public charter schools dispersed across many other schools the following year.
Students from closed public charter schools tend to disperse to many different schools, regardless of the presence or absence of a takeover school option. The wide dispersion of students across dozens of schools each year demonstrates the array of options families consider when evaluating next steps, similar to the choices made by the majority of District public school families. The median number of schools where students enrolled in non-takeover situations was 35 with the median student enrollment at each school ranging from 1 to 4. In takeover situations, the median number of schools of enrollment was 48 with the median student enrollment ranging from 1 to 2.

A small but substantial subset of students experienced multiple closures.
There were also 641 students from closed schools who went on to enroll at other public charter schools that later closed within the analytic timeframe. This highlights the need for families to be aware of their new charter school’s financial standing, progress towards charter goals, academic achievement, and financial compliance to avoid experiencing additional closures. Most of these students were enrolled at two closing public charter schools (632), while nine students were enrolled in three closed schools. One series of closures account for more than a quarter of students experiencing multiple closures: 171 students were enrolled at Community Academy PCS Amos III Armstrong in SY13-14 and subsequently enrolled in Community Academy PCS Butler Global (a school in the same LEA that had co-located in the same building as Amos III) in SY14-15. (See Table 1 for instances where students were impacted by two school closures.) More than half of students enrolled at multiple closing schools experienced two consecutive years of closures (362 or 56%).

Table 1. Number of students impacted by multiple closures with first and subsequent closures, SY2013-14 to SY2024-25

Supporting families and minimizing disruption during school closures requires timely communication and support, as students tend to disperse across many schools across both sectors as well as out of the public school system.
School closures are the exception rather than the norm but have an outsize impact on the closing school’s students, families, and staff. A majority of the students from closed public charter schools tend to stay in the charter sector, whereas a number transition to DCPS or leave the public school system altogether, especially when closures are announced late. Takeover schools sometimes ease this transition, but students still disperse across dozens of schools even when takeover schools are available. These patterns underscore the importance of timely communication, supports, and strong planning to minimize disruption and support families during closures.

Notes

¹ Washington Metropolitan Opportunity School, a DCPS alternative school, closed the end of SY2019-20. Two former special education schools, Mamie D Lee School and Sharpe Health School, were included in the DCPS 2012 closure announcement and consolidated into River Terrace Education Campus, a newly modernized full special education school located at the former River Terrace ES, in SY2014-15. Brookland @ Bunker Hill Education Campus reverted to an elementary school (serving only up to 5th grade) and designated its middle grades to the newly reopened Brookland MS in 2014-15.

^₂ Students enrolled at Maya Angelou PCS at the DC Jail, which is included in the count of 34 closures, are also excluded from this analysis.

³ This includes students who enrolled at two DCPS citywide schools that took over closing public charter schools: Dorothy Height ES in SY2015-16 and Excel Academy in SY2018-19.

⁴ Shares do not sum to 100% due to rounding.

⁵ Families enrolled at City Arts and Prep PCS were notified by the closing school of the potential acquisition by Friendship PCS before the lottery deadline; the DC PCSB vote on Friendship PCC’s acquisition of City Arts and Prep PCS occurred after the lottery deadline.

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Making dollars and sense: how DC funds our public school systems through the uniform per student funding formula

October 8, 2025 by TJ Sell, Director of Budget and Performance | [email protected]

Investing in our Students
It’s back-to-school season in the District, and while our nearly 100,000 students are heading into math class, we’ve been focused on the math that makes up our public schools’ budgets. This year, DC allocated over $2.8 billion to support public schools across the city. Most of these dollars flow through the Uniform Per Student Funding Formula (UPSFF), which provides per-student dollars to local education agencies (LEAs).

The UPSFF is a best-in-class funding approach built on two principles: stability and equity. It provides consistent funding for every student while targeting additional dollars to students with greater needs.

Stability: A Strong Foundation for Every Student
Each year, central to the UPSFF is the foundation level — the base amount of funding allocated per student — which is adjusted for different grade levels to reflect the cost of services required learning stage. Over time, this foundation level has grown in step with the real costs of providing a high-quality education. Since 2015, the foundation level has increased by nearly 60%, rising from $9,492 to $15,070 per student for the current school year

Equity: Targeting Resources Where They’re Needed Most
Because students have diverse needs and circumstances, additional resources beyond the foundation level are vital for LEAs to meet those needs. The UPSFF accomplishes this through supplemental weights which serve as multipliers of the foundation, including:

• Special education students
• English language learners (ELL)
• Students considered “at-risk” (such as those experiencing homelessness, in foster care, or qualifying for federal assistance programs)

For example, last school year the at-risk weight increased from 0.24 to 0.30, adding an additional $1,269 per at-risk student (see end of this post for a complete list of weights in the formula). These targeted investments help close achievement gaps, expand programming, and create safe, supportive learning environments across the District.

Research confirms that this methodology works. The Deputy Mayor for Education’s 2023 School Funding Study found that the UPSFF’s weights, amounts, and categories are aligned with national best practices and expert recommendations, ensuring our schools are robustly resourced year-over-year to meet the growing costs of delivering a high-quality education.

How Funding Flows to Schools
Funding through the UPSFF is budgeted for LEAs, based on projected enrollments for the coming school year. After the District’s annual budget is approved, LEAs then use allocation models to fund individual schools based on UPSFF and anticipated federal and private resources, giving them autonomy to align resources with individual school needs.

For example, DC Public Schools (DCPS) uses its School Funding Model to allocate both UPSFF and other revenue sources to its 117 schools. Principals work with Local School Advisory Teams (LSATs) made up of parents, educators, and community members to decide how to best budget total available resources.

Starting this School Year, DCPS introduced the School Sustainability Fund, which minimizes schools’ year-over-year shifts and ensures they can maintain appropriate staffing levels based on projected enrollments.

Beyond UPSFF: Other Funding Sources
While the UPSFF is the primary source of school funding, LEAs also receive federal, local, and private grants to supplement programming. For example:

• Federal Title funding: Last school year, LEAs received $73 million in Title grants to support English learners and students from low-income households and strengthen academic programming.
• Citywide programs: Local resources from other DC agencies such as the School Health Services Program (DC Health) and the School Behavioral Health Program (Department of Behavioral Health) provide critical health and wellness services in schools.

Together, these funding streams create a comprehensive support system that helps schools meet a wide range of student needs.

A Decade of Growth, A Future of Opportunity
If all of this sounds a little like Algebra class, that’s the point. The UPSFF is designed to serve our complex and evolving public school system that deals with different variables each school year. But here’s the bottom line: When we invest more in schools, students do better.

Over the past decade, UPSFF funding for LEAs has doubled. In that same period, DC has seen:

• More students enroll;
• More students graduate; and,
• More students succeed, including the largest gains in math and English language arts/literacy on statewide assessments since before the pandemic

These are not just numbers; they represent real opportunities and better futures for thousands of DC students.

To keep improving, the District convenes a working group of education advocates, LEA leaders, and public servants twice each year to review the UPSFF and recommend refinements. It’s part of our commitment to making sure every dollar counts and every student has what they need to thrive.

Learn more about how DC resources its 67 local education agencies by reading DME’s 2023 School Funding Study or how you can be part of the conversation by visiting the UPSFF and the District’s biannually-convening working group.

View the Appendix: UPSFF weights proposed for school year 2025-26.

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Long-term public school enrollment projected to grow by 550 students by SY26-27, remaining above current levels until SY31-32

October 8, 2025 by Rory Lawless and Jenn Comey, Planning and Analysis | [email protected]
Contributions by Samuel Kligman, summer intern

Across the country, public school enrollment trends are in decline. However, enrollment in the District is expected to buck these trends in the short term, with 0.6% growth projected by SY26-27, after which a decline in enrollment is expected. While the District did rebound from the COVID-19 pandemic, the recovery shows signs of slowing, and declining births mean we may begin a corresponding fall in enrollment manifesting in the early grades.

• The strong post-pandemic enrollment recovery has driven steadier long-term enrollment projections compared to previous iterations.
• Higher birth-to-preKindergarten 3 (PK3) enrollment rates have shored up the public education system despite fewer births.
• Next year’s Master Facilities Plan Supplement will update the long-term enrollment projections capturing 2025’s emerging trends.

Following the disruption caused by the COVID-19 pandemic during SY20-21 and SY21-22, long-range enrollment projections predicted steep declines. However, starting SY22-23 the District experienced three years of enrollment growth. During this period, around 4,100 more students enrolled compared to SY19-20.

This strong enrollment recovery has, therefore, influenced the 2024 Master Facilities Plan (MFP) Annual Supplement 5- and 10-year enrollment projections. These latest projections using a baseline of SY24-25 show continued enrollment growth through SY26-27, contrasting with previous predictions of decline. Between SY24-25 and SY26-27, the DME projects 550 more PK3 to 12th grade and Alternative students will enroll, meaning an enrollment peak of almost 94,000 public school students.

Figure 1: Comparison of actual PK3-12 and Alternative enrollment and projections

While these trends illustrate the resilience of DC’s public education system, the projections show the increased pressure of declining births on enrollment. By 2023, the annual number of births had fallen by almost 2,000 since the peak of 9,854 in 2016. Preliminary numbers for 2024 show a further decline of around 300 compared to 2023.

Figure 2: Births since 2013

Fewer births, without being offset by positive net migration (domestic or international), reduce the number of students eligible to enter the system which, in turn, impacts enrollment as cohorts move through. The DC public education ecosystem has, nevertheless, tempered the impact of this trend by enrolling a higher proportion of eligible students in PK3. By SY23-24, PK3 enrollment was 62% of births in 2020, exceeding the pre-pandemic high of 60.9% in SY18-19.

However, signs of stagnation were evident in SY24-25. PK3 enrollment as a percentage of 2021 births declined to 61.4%, which remains above the SY18-19 level but translates to 181 fewer students compared to SY23-24. The projections assume a continuation of this two-year trend, meaning annual decreases in PK3 enrollment are projected until SY29-30. The impact of smaller cohorts endures throughout the projection period and contributes to a loss of 590 students by SY35-36 compared to SY24-25.

SY29-30 is the first projected school year showing a return to growth based on birth forecasts, but projections this far in the future ought to be considered with caution. One reason for this warning is the continued decline in births which has outpaced the Office of Planning forecasts upon which these projections are based.

These projections do not account for new factors impacting the District in 2025, such as the recent federal workforce layoffs, transfer of federal agency personnel to locations outside the District, and latest immigration efforts. The DME will update the enrollment projections annually each spring to take account of such trends.