Before the pandemic, KIPP DC was a middle-of-the-pack charter network. Its 11 campuses tested about 2,900 students, making it by far the largest charter operator in the District. Its proficiency rates — 37 percent in ELA, 40 percent in math — were roughly in line with the charter sector average and not far from DCPS. Some individual campuses, like Promise Academy (57 percent ELA, 78 percent math) and KEY Academy (46 percent ELA), were doing well. It was a functioning, if unremarkable, school network.
That network no longer exists, at least not in any recognizable form. KIPP DC’s ELA proficiency has fallen to 18.4 percent. Its math proficiency has fallen to 14.5 percent. Every single one of the ten campuses that can be compared across time declined. The worst-hit campus, Heights Academy, went from 44 percent ELA proficiency to 10 percent, and from 66 percent math proficiency to 11 percent. This isn’t a dip. It’s a collapse — and three years into post-COVID testing, there is essentially no sign of recovery.
The trajectory
The shape of the decline is striking. KIPP DC’s scores didn’t erode gradually. They fell off a cliff between the last pre-COVID testing year (2018-19) and the first post-COVID year (2022-23), dropping roughly 20 points in ELA and 27 points in math. And then they flatlined. From 2022-23 to 2024-25 — three full years of testing — ELA has moved from 17.6 to 18.4 percent. Math has moved from 13.0 to 14.5 percent. At this rate of recovery, KIPP DC would not return to its pre-COVID math proficiency level until the 2060s.