Paul Public Charter School occupies a unique space in the Washington, DC charter school landscape. Born of a neighborhood public school founded in 1930, Paul opened as a public charter junior high school in 2000. After more than a decade as a middle school, Paul expanded to serve high school students and its first class graduated in 2016. Facing a number of successes and challenges in academic achievement, Paul is seeking to better position itself after improving its middle school and achieving Tier 1 status for the high school.

In 2021, Paul PCS partnered with DeliverEd (and data experts from EmpowerK12) to determine the pros and cons of a potential expansion into fifth grade. We conducted a series of interviews, focus groups, and surveys to gather qualitative data on a number of key questions to inform the decision making and planning for expansion. We worked to understand the benefits and concerns of the Paul community around expansion, the capacity of the school to make this shift, and the supports necessary to successfully implement an expansion of the school’s model. Our work resulted in a report to the Board with a recommendation for how and when to make this shift, as well as a follow-up partnership to build a strategic plan to execute on the plan.