Achievement First

Project Goals: AF is a charter management organization operating 17 schools serving 4,500 students in Connecticut and New York. The goals of project are (1) to provide 5,500 additional students with the achievement gap-closing education they need to graduate from college, and (2) to prove that the achievement gap can be closed at district scale.

Expect Outcomes: AF's project outcomes are: (1) serve 10,000 students in 31 schools; (2) close the achievement gap for EDS and racial/ethnic subgroups; (3) demonstrate 90 percent or higher high school graduation, college acceptance and college matriculation rates; (4) maintain student attendance rate of 96 percent and student retention rate of 95 percent; and (5) operate within a sustainable budget.

Project Contributions: AF's impact extends beyond its students through partnerships with reform-oriented organizations and districts to inform district- and state-wide reform efforts.

Project Compliance: AF has already successfully grown a network of 17 schools serving more than 4,500 students enrolled by blind lottery from its host districts. At per pupil costs equal to or less than its host districts, AF has raised achievement levels of all students, including EDS and historically disadvantaged subgroups, to meet or exceed state performance standards.

Aspire Public Schools

Aspire Public Schools (Aspire), a nonprofit Charter Management Organization located in the State of California, is requesting $15,000,000 through a CSP Replication and Expansion Grant to open 15 new charter schools in primarily low-income districts in California by 2015. CSP funds will allow Aspire to provide an additional 4,500+ economically disadvantaged students with a high-quality educational experience. The grant also will enable Aspire to both directly and indirectly influence local school policy and practice in order to achieve positive, systemic change in California's public schools. Aspire will accomplish this goal by continuing to strengthen its academic model, by sharing the knowledge gleaned from experiences with school leaders and policymakers, and by replicating successful models of leadership development, teacher training, and instruction. Ultimately, it is Aspire's goal to help trigger dramatic and sustainable change in public education by modeling change, encouraging innovation, and working with school districts and policymakers to ensure that all students in California and across America receive a high-quality education that will prepare them for life.

Goal 1 Replication: Aspire proposes to open fifteen high quality charter schools within the five years of the CSP grant in clusters within low-income, mostly minority urban districts.
Objectives: Necessary planning and start-up activities for replicating Aspire model in 15 new schools.
Outcomes: Fifteen (15) new Aspire Public Schools will be planned, approved, opened, and operated in accordance with this proposal. 4,500+ economically disadvantaged students will receive a high-quality educational experience. Fifteen (15) new Aspire Public Schools will be financially secure and sustainable.

Goal 2 Fidelity to Model: All schools created with this CSP grant will be designed and operated in a manner consistent with the established Aspire Public Schools model. Aspire's education design has seven core elements, each aligned with the others.
Objectives: All schools will have high standards and clear learning goals; All schools will have a sense of community; All schools will provide more time for Learning; All schools will provide a balanced curriculum; All schools will use a variety of teaching methods; All schools will employ rigorous and ongoing assessment; All schools will provide extra support for students as needed.
Outcome: All new schools created with CSP support will be faithful scale-up replications of the high-quality charter schools operated by Aspire Public Schools.

Foundation for a Greater Opportunity

Foundation for a Greater Opportunity has opened four charter schools in the Bronx in New York City. The first school, Icahn Charter School 1 (ICS 1), opened in 2001 and has reached its ultimate goal of 324 students in grades K-8. The scores the children received on the New York State testing results of ICS 1 have always been impressive—last year, the test results were 93.6% and 100% respectively for the English Language Arts test and the Math test (the 2010 results are still embargoed by the State). When the Foundation realized that its model produced such high testing results, it decided to open more charter schools using the same model. Icahn Charter School 2 in 2007; Icahn Charter School 3 in 2008; Icahn Charter School 4 in 2009. The two other schools that have testing grades have produced scores at least equal to ICS 1. The 2009 testing results for ICS 2 were 100% on both the ELA and the Math. The 2009-2010 scores for all charters schools are embargoed, but our ICS 1, ICS 2 and ICS 3 results are equivalent to previous years. Each of the schools is financially healthy, is in compliance and has no student safety issues. The Foundation plans to add a grade each year to ICS 2, ICS 3 and ICS 4 until they each reach K-8. The Foundation plans to open Icahn Charter School 5 in September 2011 with grades K-2, adding a grade each year through 8th grade. This grant money would be used to provide a finely-tuned, concentrated, year-long professional development program and the materials needed for the program for each of our schools. It is our goal to educate more educationally disadvantaged children so that their testing scores prove that our charter school model educates all children at the highest levels and that all children can learn.

Each of our charter schools is in the Bronx, New York. The Bronx is considered to be an area of educationally disadvantaged students because of the low income of its residents and its history of under-achieving children. We specifically chose the Bronx because we wanted to prove that all children can learn regardless of family income. We have proved that with our schools. In spite of the free/reduced lunch percentages at our schools being 85%, 77%, 84% and 87%, the children's results on the NY State tests range from 93% to 100%. We will replicate those results with the funding to continue to prove that educationally disadvantaged children can achieve at the highest levels.

Each charter school has state funds in the form of AOE. Each of the Icahn Schools will contribute 25% of the total needed for the school to this program. Every year in the Icahn Charter Schools' history, the schools have been financially healthy. In the first year of the first charter school, the Foundation advanced it money for its first year of operation (which was then repaid by the end of the charter), but the subsequent Icahn Charter Schools have been able to cover initial expenses with the AOE and the CSP grant.

IDEA Public Schools

IDEA Public Schools is located in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas along the state's border with Mexico. Ninety-seven percent of the community is Hispanic; South Texas, specifically the Rio Grande Valley, has the highest concentration of Latinos in the United States. According to 2008 US Census data, 33.53% of all families live in households at or below the poverty level. A waiting list of over 12,500 students is testament alone that IDEA is in demand and that the people of South Texas want the best for their children. This CSP proposal from IDEA Public Schools meets competitive preference priorities 1 (serving a low-income student population) and 3 (contributing matching funds) and, when funded, will provide financial support to grow IDEA from a system of 16 school and an enrollment of 6,839 to 38 schools and a full-scale enrollment of 25,935—more than tripling the number of students impacted by IDEA's proven and award winning education system.

Project Goals: 1) Achieve College-Ready Student Results; 2) Build a Strong and Sustainable Organization; 3) Grow to Scale with Quality.

KIPP Foundation in consortium with KIPP Regions^*

Growing the KIPP Network of Schools – Achieving Excellence on the Path to Scale
Project Description: While only half of African-American and Latino students in America graduate from high school on time, more than 95 percent of KIPP's eighth-grade completers have graduated high school, and 87 percent have matriculated to college. Several independent third-party studies and internal evaluations consistently show KIPP's track record of dramatically increasing student achievement and closing race-based and income-based achievement gaps. KIPP schools are outperforming their local district and state counterparts in terms of student achievement while serving a student population that is more than 95 percent African American or Latino and in which over 80 percent of students qualify for the federal free and reduced price lunch program. In addition to KIPP's student success, the KIPP network has also proven to be a highly-successful school model, with an unmatched record of scaling from one school to nearly 100 schools serving more than 26,000 students in pre-kindergarten through 12th grade.

Project Goals: Utilizing grant funds KIPP will: (1) open 21 new KIPP schools in educationally disadvantaged communities and (2) expand substantially the number of students served in 11 existing schools.

Expected Outcomes: At full enrollment, KIPP schools opened or expanded with grant funding will serve 15,000 students in educationally disadvantaged communities.

Contribution to Research, Policy or Practice: KIPP commits to share with the broader education sector all of the processes, practices, and strategies employed to accomplish the goals, objectives and outcomes described within this application.

^* KIPP regions applying in consortium with the KIPP Foundation are KIPP Austin, KIPP Chicago, KIPP Colorado, KIPP DC, KIPP Delta, KIPP Houston, KIPP NYC, KIPP Philadelphia, KIPP San Antonio, KIPP Metro Atlanta, KIPP New Orleans, KIPP TEAM Newark, KIPP LEAD, and KIPP Academy Lynn.

Lawndale Educational & Regional Network (LEARN)

LEARN Charter School Network is requesting $5,510,000 from CSP to support its expansion and replication. LEARN received its charter in 2001 and has grown from 110 students in one school to 990 across three schools over the last nine years thanks to an aggressive growth plan launched in 2008. LEARN has very impressive academic outcomes, strong financial management, and absolutely no issues in the area of student safety, financial management, or statutory or regulatory compliance. Our expansion plans outlined in this application fully meet the competitive priorities of this grant: 93% of LEARN's students qualify for Free and Reduced Lunch; our plan was designed in partnership with our LEA to serve students attending schools that have been identified for improvement, corrective action, closure, or restructuring; and we have secured matching funds that are equal to 32.3% of our requested amount. With the assistance of CSP funds we will accelerate our expansion plans and reach our goal of opening three new schools and expand two of our existing schools over the next three years. This will increase our enrollment from 960 to 2,310 or 140%. In order to do this, we will build the capacity of our Teacher Apprentice Program, Student Support Services and Charter Management Organization. In addition, we will purchase educational materials and supplies for 54 new classrooms. The outcomes we will be measuring include: serving an additional 1,350 new students, having at least 95% of our graduates attend college preparatory high schools, achieving 90% meet/exceed on ISAT by the end of the grant term, growing 5 points in national percentile rankings per year (as defined by MAP), and having at least 90% of our teachers in the apprentice program become lead teachers in their own classrooms.

Mastery Charter School

Mastery Charter School is a college preparatory K-12 charter school network serving predominantly low-income (84%), minority students (95%) in the high-crime urban communities of Philadelphia. Our expertise is in turning around formerly failing public schools and converting them to excellent charter schools. Mastery schools are created around the vision that we exist to close the achievement gap and deliver break-through results for all children in the communities we serve. Under this model, Mastery was named an Exemplar Charter School by the U.S. Department of Education (1 of 15 nationally), earned the EPIC award for value-added growth two of our campuses in 2009 (only 2/21 charter school winners nationally), and meet or exceed the state average in math and Reading by year four of operation at every school.

The Mastery Charter School Expansion grant will support the creation of 15 new high-quality Mastery charter schools serving more than 8,500 additional students in the cities of Philadelphia and Camden between Fall 2010 and Fall 2014. Grant funds will be used to support one-time start up costs associated with the planning year and first two years of operating each new school. Based on the Mastery financial model, each school becomes fiscally sustainable on per pupil dollars by the end of their third year of operation. A small portion of grant funds will also be used to ramp up Central Office support of the new schools through enhanced teacher training and new teacher coaching programs as we add more than 145 new teachers each academic year for the next five years. Resources will be developed to document Mastery's capacity building initiatives over the next five years so that other charter operators nationally can use these tools in planning expansion efforts. Mastery's Office of Innovation will provide administrative oversight for the expansion project and ensure that objectives are achieved in a timely and efficient manner.

Noble Network of Charter Schools

Through its strategic expansion and replication program, the Noble Network of Charter Schools will expand its educational model, which is proven effective: Noble is the top-ranked open enrollment high school in Chicago according to 2009 ACT scores and sends more than 90% of its mostly minority and low-income students to college each year. Noble recently completed a 5-year strategic plan with the goal of increasing its capacity to 10,000 students (10% of Chicago Public School students) by 2015 via expansion of current campuses and opening of six new high school campuses.

Noble has opened nine new high school campuses modeled on its original campus since 2006. Replication efforts have strengthened Noble's performance as seen through annual improvements in key standardized test scores including the ACT, Prairie State Achievement Exam and Education Planning and Assessment System tests. Noble achieved its greatest ACT growth to date from 2008 to 2009, the first year that expansion campuses took the ACT. This strongly suggests correlation between expansion and academic growth.

Noble's success is largely the result of its cultural and academic models, which fuel the achievement of the ten Noble high schools across Chicago. These will continue to be the key contribution for research, policy and practice.

Noble's objectives are to increase the number of students receiving a high-quality education, while further improving student achievement. By increasing in size, Noble increases the efficiency of its model, and also benefits from the development and expansion of new and existing systems that strengthen the performance of all Noble schools. Noble's final objective is to ensure the organizational sustainability of the CMO to effectively support the organization's growth.

Project Yes, Inc.

YES Prep is a model for what is possible within the charter school and public education systems: affordable, sustainable, and replicable schools that provide a college preparatory education for ALL students and make college acceptance a graduation requirement. YES Prep has received Texas' highest accountability rating, Exemplary; and its schools have been ranked one of the Top 100 Public Schools by Newsweek and U.S. News & World Report and received the 2009 Blue Ribbon School Award. This year, YES Prep graduated its tenth senior class, 100 percent college bound. The CMO locates its schools in impoverished neighborhoods, which produces a recruitment pool of majority educationally disadvantaged students: the economically disadvantaged, English learners, migratory children, first generation college goers, and ethnic minorities. Due to the success of its high quality educational model, the enrollment wait list to attend its current seven schools ranges between 4,000 and 6,000 children. To meet this demand, the CMO respectfully requests $15M to execute its three Strategic Growth Initiatives: (A) Open six new schools in low income and underperforming neighborhoods that will serve Grades 6-12; (B) Expand two existing schools in low income and underperforming neighborhoods that will ultimately serve Grades 6-12; and (C) Implement a human capital development network capable of training, competitively compensating, and retaining highly qualified teachers for the proposed schools. At a total of 13 schools, YES Prep will have a school in every low income and underperforming feeder pattern in Houston ISD and serve 10 percent of the 6th–12th graders currently enrolled in Houston ISD, and will send 1,150+ seniors to college every year.

Propel Schools Foundation

The Propel Schools Foundation of Pittsburgh, Pa. seeks funding from the U.S. Department of Education's "Replication and Expansion of High-Quality Charter Schools" grant program to support expansion of one existing Propel K-8 school (by adding a high school); replication of Propel's educational model at four new schools; and implementation of Propel's model at an existing charter school in Wilmington, Delaware currently designated for school improvement.

Propel's existing schools have guided disadvantaged students to improved academic achievement. Propel's educational model is based on a vision of inspiring each student toward three goals—academic excellence, community service, and personal power—and on six "Promising Principles" that together create a distinctive, high-energy, motivating school climate: agile instruction, embedded support, culture of dignity, fully valued arts program, vibrant teaching communities, and quest for excellence. Propel is significantly outperforming statewide averages and its sending districts with regard to overall test scores as well as in performance by educationally disadvantaged and minority students.

Anticipated project outcomes include the establishment of six new schools implementing Propel's educational model, achieving student academic proficiency rates higher than statewide averages while serving a predominantly educationally disadvantaged student body; expanded learning opportunities for disadvantaged students; and high rates of parent satisfaction, student retention, and teacher retention.

Success Charter Network

Success Charter Network (SCN) has developed an innovative school model that independent research has shown increases student achievement by 13-20%. SCN's seeks to expand its program to 19 schools educating over 6,600 students over the next 5 years and to 40 schools serving over 20,000 students over the next 10 years. Each school will be opened in a community serving high-need students from low-income, high minority communities in New York City and will prepare its scholars to be college and career-ready by closing the achievement gap between them and their peers in more affluent communities.

SCN plans to achieve this ambitious goal through a combination of its innovative school model and its strategic growth plan. Its school model is based on employing rigorous standards and a whole child curriculum, setting specific goals, using on-going assessments to inform instruction, creating a professional learning environment with a performance management system for adults, utilizing quality professional development, and leveraging technology to create a blended instructional environment. Its strategic growth plan that allows it to expand while maintaining quality is based on becoming self-sustaining, securing matching funds, an upfront investment to get the model right, employing a cluster model, and cultivating demand.

While SCN needs the initial upfront investment provided through this grant to fund its\ replication, each year its funding request is a smaller percentage of the total project cost as its student enrollment, and therefore its per pupil revenues, increases. At the conclusion of the grant, SCN will be able to continue operating its existing schools and opening additional schools solely on its per pupil funding and without any additional federal grant funding.

Uncommon Schools

Uncommon Schools (Uncommon) is a nonprofit organization that starts and manages outstanding urban charter public schools that close the achievement gap and prepare low-income students to enter, succeed in and graduate from college. Uncommon builds uncommonly great schools by developing and managing regional networks that are philosophically aligned and highly accountable. In addition to opening and managing high-performing schools, Uncommon is also committed to expanding its social impact by sharing best practices and advocating for policy changes that provide educational options to under-served families.

Uncommon currently manages 16 schools in New York City; Rochester, New York; Troy, New York; and Newark, New Jersey. This fall, the organization will grow to 24 schools serving nearly 4,000 students in its current geographies and Boston, Massachusetts. After several years of building a strong group of talented leaders and teachers, as well as proven, replicable systems, Uncommon is in the midst of an ambitious growth plan to ultimately encompass more than 38 schools, serving nearly 14,000 K to 12th grade students.

The shared mission of these schools is to prepare students to enter, succeed in, and graduate from college by creating transformative college-prep opportunities for low-income children. Uncommon has achieved outstanding academic results based on nationally-normed tests, statewide exams, and graduation milestones. Schools consistently outperform neighborhood schools, rank at the top of their cities, and are among their states' top-performing urban schools. In addition to academic results, Uncommon tracks the effectiveness of its instructional programs, management services and operational practices in order to disseminate the systems that work best to schools outside of the Uncommon network. The most frequently cited example of this is the Taxonomy of Effective Teaching Practices (Taxonomy), a collection of the 50 techniques that most drive student achievement. To date, Uncommon has shared the Taxonomy with over 4,000 external teachers with an estimated impact of increasing teacher effectiveness to over 250,000 students. Uncommon Schools expects to systemize additional tools and practices, and disseminate them, in an effort to influence and catalyze student achievement in schools across the country.

The focus of the following grant is a request for CSP funding to fuel the growth of Uncommon schools in upstate New York and Newark, New Jersey, specifically. Uncommon's strong track record, talented leadership team, and replicable systems uniquely position the organization for federal CSP funding. Although all Uncommon schools will be sustainable on the public dollar at full enrollment, public and private philanthropy is necessary in the start-up funding years when the per pupil cost of running the school is higher due to many one-time expenses and initially low levels of enrollment. State laws in New York and New Jersey do not permit an existing charter to apply for additional CSP grants when opening new, distinct schools. Federal support of Uncommon's True North network in upstate New York and North Star network in Newark, New Jersey would guarantee that nearly 3,000 additional low-income students in these campuses have an opportunity for a high-quality education and the preparation necessary to succeed in and graduate from college. Uncommon respectfully requests $5.2 million in federal CSP funding to support the growth of seven new schools and two existing schools in Uncommon's True North and North Star Networks.