, released by Stanford University鈥檚 Center for Research on Education Outcomes (CREDO), focused on pre-pandemic performance, looking at the 2017-18 and 2018-19 school years.

It found that in the 2018-2019 school year, charter school students learned the equivalent of 64 more days of instruction in reading and 116 days in math, compared to their district school peers. Black charter school students had even bigger gains, with 86 more days in reading and 144 days in math relative to Black students in district schools. 

In a statement, Indianapolis Superintendent said the study 鈥減rovides another piece of critical data in our relentless mission for all schools to be better.鈥�

The findings reinforce the district鈥檚 belief that diving into data about academic performance at all schools helps educators 鈥渂uild on what works, and fix where we aren鈥檛 delivering for students,鈥� she said.

The findings showed that Black charter school students in Indianapolis had more growth in math than the average Black student statewide; they showed similar growth in reading. Similarly, Black students in Innovation Network Schools saw growth on par with peers statewide. are a group of 20 public schools in the city that enjoy complete, charter-like autonomy over academics and operations. While seven are actually charter schools, the remaining 13 are either new schools, strong district schools whose staffs are trying something new, or struggling schools that have been 鈥渞estarted鈥� with outside partners.

But Black students in traditional district schools performed worse than the typical Indiana student in both reading and math.

The new study, part of an ongoing CREDO series examining school performance in 10 cities, follows a 2019 study finding that growth in both reading and math was weaker than state averages in 2015-16 and 2016-17.

When researchers compared student performance citywide for the current study, they found that students at charters and Innovation Network Schools outperformed district peers across subgroups: Black charter school students saw stronger growth than district students in both reading and math, and Hispanic students in charter schools and Innovation Network Schools showed similar gains.

So did low-income students at charter schools. Similarly, English Language Learners in city charter and Innovation Network Schools saw better gains than district students.

Brandon Brown, CEO of , an Indianapolis nonprofit that has launched 41 schools, said one key to the charter sector鈥檚 success in the city is that the vast majority are locally grown, with leaders 鈥渨ho know Indianapolis.鈥� Most of those leaders, he said, are also people of color who directly reflect the racial backgrounds of students. 

The sector鈥檚 performance is 鈥渁 direct result of schools that are created and sustained relative to what our community wants and needs. And I do think that that’s pretty unique, when you look across much of the work that’s happening nationally.鈥�

Brown also noted that local officials look favorably upon charters 鈥� the mayor鈥檚 office is the largest authorizer in the city 鈥� and don鈥檛 see their growth as 鈥渁 zero sum game.鈥�

鈥淭here’s nowhere in the country where the school district and charters work as closely together,鈥� he said. 

Darius Sawyers, principal of Paramount Englewood, a 5th-8^th-grade school that鈥檚 part of the Paramount Schools of Excellence network, said the sector鈥檚 small scale allows him to collaborate regularly with other charter leaders, in a kind of ongoing principals鈥� consultancy. 鈥淲e’re talking best practices, we’re talking data, we’re talking, 鈥榃hat are you doing to move the data or move the needle?鈥欌��

He said being part of a local network has advantages. 鈥淓verybody’s right here,鈥� he said. 鈥淚f not in the same building, a block or two away.鈥�

Austin Hauser, director of Academic Accountability at Herron High School, said his small network of three Herron Classical Schools is 鈥渁bsolutely homegrown,鈥� founded by a local teacher with more than 30 years of experience. 鈥淚t was started really as a neighborhood movement.鈥�

Being homegrown, he said, allows teachers and administrators 鈥渢o focus on exactly what we need in our community 鈥�. We’re not worried about who we should be in Chicago or in Cincinnati or wherever the network may be located. We are in Indianapolis.鈥�