NYC Charter School Students Spend Hundreds More Hours in Class. It Shows.
Charter schools serving many of the same students as the DOE are producing dramatically different academic outcomes — while spending far less per pupil.
Charter schools and DOE schools operate under the same state law, in the same neighborhoods, and serve broadly similar student populations, yet produce strikingly different results.
More than 150,000 NYC students attend charter schools, roughly 1 in 7 public school students in the city. On race, poverty, and geography, these systems serve many of the same students1. Charter schools do enroll somewhat fewer English Language Learners and students with disabilities. But other differences are structural: different calendars, different school days, different funding models, and dramatically different academic outcomes.
In a recent piece for The Bigger Apple, I explained how New York City’s students spend fewer hours in the classroom than their peers across the state’s “Big 5” school systems, a result of labor negotiations with the UFT.
The NYC DOE 2025-26 school calendar begins on September 4, 2025, and ends on June 26, 2026. Under the UFT contract, the standard school day lasts 6 hours and 50 minutes.
Success Academy, the city’s largest charter network, began classes on August 11 for some grades and will conclude the school year on June 12. By the time DOE students arrive for their first day of school, some Success Academy students will already have spent more than three weeks in class. KIPP NYC begins on August 25 and runs through June 18, with school days lasting from 7:30 a.m. until 4:00 p.m. — roughly 100 minutes longer than the DOE school day.
A DOE student receives roughly 1,200 instructional hours annually. A Success Academy student receives closer to 1,400. A KIPP NYC student receives nearly 1,500. Over the course of a single school year, charter school students receive the equivalent of more than a month of additional instruction.
And those estimates assume perfect attendance. During the 2024–25 school year, one in three NYC DOE students missed at least 10% of the school year. (Data on charter school attendance is not readily available.)
Research shows that more time spent in the classroom leads to greater student learning. While many variables contribute to student outcomes, more instructional time in classrooms is associated with greater student gains.
How the Students Perform
On the 2025 New York State third-grade exams, 58% of NYC DOE students were proficient in English Language Arts (ELA) and 63.3% in math citywide. Across 29 elementary schools, 92% of Success Academy’s students were proficient in ELA and 97% in math. KIPP NYC students averaged 66% in ELA and 75% in math.
These differences are especially notable because many charter schools operate in districts where academic performance remains among the lowest in the city.
In District 5 in Harlem, where only 42% of DOE third graders are proficient in ELA, nearby charter schools posted substantially higher results: KIPP STAR reached 94% proficiency, Success Academy Harlem 2 reached 90%, Success Academy Harlem 5 reached 82%, and KIPP Infinity reached 66%.2
Not every charter school dramatically outperforms its surrounding district. KIPP Bronx III, for example, reached 48% proficiency in third-grade ELA — still five points above the surrounding DOE district average.
Across 37 charter elementary schools in the Success Academy and KIPP NYC networks, the average school outperformed its surrounding DOE district by more than 30% in both ELA and math.
The Differences Extend Beyond Elementary School
On the 2025 state exams, KIPP NYC eighth graders reached proficiency at rates of 7% in ELA and 70% in math. In the DOE districts where those schools operate, eighth-grade proficiency averaged 47% in ELA and 46% in math.
Success Academy and KIPP NYC are not the entire charter sector story. Smaller schools such as South Bronx Classical have also produced similarly stellar outcomes in some of the city’s lowest-performing districts.
At South Bronx Classical, third graders reached 92% proficiency in reading and 96.5% proficiency in math. Eighth graders posted 98% proficiency in reading and 99% proficiency in math.
Meanwhile, across the Bronx overall, only 44.2% of DOE third graders were proficient in reading, and 51% were proficient in math.
What We Pay
NYC DOE spending reached roughly $32,000 per-pupil in the 2024-25 school year, on a budget approaching $40 billion. According to audited financial statements, Success Academy spent $21,218 per student during the 2024–25 school year, while KIPP NYC spent $21,862 per student.
Both networks also received philanthropic support, though at modest levels: Success Academy reported approximately $216 in additional philanthropic funding per student, while KIPP NYC reported roughly $112 per student.
Conclusion
DOE students attend school roughly 130 fewer hours annually than the national average and several hundred fewer hours than many of their charter school peers located only blocks away. In many districts, fewer than 40% of students reach grade-level proficiency by third grade, despite the city spending almost twice as much money per student as charter schools.
By the time charter students graduate, they have had at least two years of additional instruction than their DOE peers.
Until instructional time and student outcomes become priorities in NYC’s labor negotiations, the charter sector will continue to do what DOE schools cannot, and students will be the ones paying the price.
The 3rd graders tested at KIPP Star were 92% economically disadvantaged, 8 percent English Language Learners, and 15% students with disabilities. Success Academy Harlem 2 tested 88% economically disadvantaged students, 7% English Language Learners, 26% students with disabilities. Success Academy Harlem 5’s were 77% economically disadvantaged, 12% English Language learners, and 23% students with disabilities. Third-grade students at KIPP Infinity were 95% economically disadvantaged, 16% English Language Learners, and 22% students with disabilities.
 | A guest post by
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Agree that more hours spent in the classroom means more successful learning. However, disagree on many other points. Starting in August--no, kids need a summer break to recharge. Strong disagree on the methods some of these charters use to educate their students. If "success" is achieved by means of berating, embarrassing, pressuring students--which is apparently Success Academy's method of instruction--you can count me out. Also, any child with a learning disability who requires an IEP should be warned about enrolling at a S.A. Not only are their needs unlikely to be met, they are likely to be counseled out. Lastly, tremendous teacher turnover and high burnout rate at charters. Have experienced it personally.
One aspect of performance I think should be acknowledged more often is the attrition rate of charter schools and the disproportionate rate of students with IEPs or chronic attendance issues within that. It is much easier to perform highly on state assessments if certain students/families are "weeded out" over time.