PhiladelphiaDistrict vs chartermedium
Renaissance charters underperform regular charters — and barely outperform district
Thesis
Of the 17 Renaissance Charter schools (district schools converted to charter operators 2010-2015), 15 have Keystone Literature data. Median proficiency is 27.4% — below the 31.7% median of the 62 other charters in our data and only 2.4pp above the district median of 25.0%. The Renaissance program's promise was district-school-becomes-charter-and-improves; the median tells a more complicated story.
Supporting findings
- Renaissance Charter (n=15): avg Keystone Lit proficiency 28.1%, median 27.4%.
- Regular charter (n=62): avg 33.8%, median 31.7%.
- District (n=217): avg 31.9%, median 25.0% — wider distribution.
- Renaissance charters serve students from the (failing) school they took over, so demographic baseline is closer to district; comparison should account for student-body match.
Reporting directions
- Match each Renaissance Charter with 2-3 same-network district schools using peer-group methodology.
- Pull the conversion year for each (Master List's Major Intervention Year column has this).
- Trajectory: Keystone Lit by year per Renaissance school — is the cohort improving since conversion?
Methodology & replication recipe — the queries + sources behind the findings above.