The top reported proficiency rate is 24% in Math.
Original Research by School Decision on Center City Pcs - Petworth
CenterCity PCS - Petworth is a public charter school in the Petworth section of Northwest Washington, serving pre-kindergarten through eighth grade. It is one of several campuses in the Center City Public Charter School network, which spans multiple wards across the District. The school sits on Webster Street NW, in a residential part of the city that has seen steady change as Washington's broader growth has pushed development and investment into neighborhoods beyond the monumental core.
The school is small for a campus serving a full pre-K-to-8 span. Its enrollment is modest, with relatively even distribution across grade levels, though the pre-kindergarten and middle-school grades are among the larger cohorts. The student body is predominantly Black and Hispanic, with only a handful of students from other racial or ethnic backgrounds. This dual-majority composition is a defining feature of the school's peer environment and reflects the surrounding Petworth community, which has long been a predominantly Black and Latino neighborhood in upper Northwest.
Academically, the most recent state assessment results place the school in a lower range on both tested subjects. In math, roughly a quarter of tested students in grades three through eight met or exceeded expectations. English language arts results were similar, with about a quarter of students reaching proficiency. Science results, drawn from an earlier testing cycle, were strikingly low: in both fifth and eighth grade science, the proficiency rate fell in the lowest reported band, with no students scoring proficient in either grade. These are the only assessment figures available, and they cover different years, so a parent looking at trends over time would not find enough here to judge direction. A parent may want to look into this further with the school, particularly around science instruction and what supports are in place for students working below grade level in math and reading.
Several data points that would help round out the picture are missing. The school did not report free-or-reduced-price lunch counts, special education rates, or English learner rates in the data available. Without these, it is hard to assess the level of economic need among enrolled families or the share of students receiving specialized services. Information on discipline, staffing ratios, attendance, and course offerings was also absent. These gaps mean the portrait here is thin on the operational and support side, and a family considering enrollment would want to ask the school directly about class sizes, intervention programs, and how it serves students with identified needs.
What the data does show, beyond test scores, is that the school belongs to a charter network making a visible capital investment in its educational program. Center City PCS recently opened a dedicated Makerspace, described publicly as the first K-8 facility of its kind in the District. The building, purchased in 2022 and opened in 2025, houses multiple labs equipped for hands-on science, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics projects and serves students across the network's campuses. This suggests the network is directing resources toward experiential and applied learning, though the available data does not specify how regularly Petworth campus students access the facility or how it is integrated into their curriculum.
Because the school does not serve high school grades, there is no graduation rate to report. That is expected for a pre-K-to-8 campus and does not reflect a gap in the school's performance.
The housing market around the school gives a sense of what families face if they are considering moving into the area. Home values in the school's zip code sit above the District's overall benchmark, and rents are in a range that reflects Washington's relatively expensive rental market. Both buying and renting near the school require a budget that exceeds national norms. The local housing market has seen a modest recent decline in values, while rents have edged upward, patterns that track broader regional trends rather than anything specific to the school's attendance area.
For a parent weighing this school, the picture is mixed in a specific way. The campus offers a continuous pre-K-through-8 pathway in a small setting with a coherent peer community, and the network's investment in a Makerspace points toward a commitment to hands-on learning. At the same time, current proficiency rates in reading and math are low, and science results are weaker still. Without data on special populations, staffing, or program offerings, much of what a family would want to know to judge fit day-to-day is not available here. A visit to the school and direct questions about academic supports, the Makerspace's role in regular instruction, and how the school serves its diverse learners would be the logical next step.
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