Royal Academy of Excellence, San Antonio TX

Original Research by School Decision on Royal Academy of Excellence

Royal Academy of Excellence is a public charter school in San Antonio serving kindergarten through eighth grade. It opened in 2021 in a renovated historic building on the Southside, created as a neighborhood option in an area where many traditional public schools were underperforming. The school operates under Royal Public Schools, a tuition-free charter district aspiring eventually toward a full K-12 program, adding one grade level each year. Families enrolling younger children are investing in a school that will grow with them through the middle grades.

The school uses STREAMS-8, a whole-child, project-based instructional model integrating Science, Technology, Reading, Engineering, Arts, Math, and Social-Emotional Learning. It provides free after-school programming, school supplies, and backpacks. The student body is predominantly Hispanic, about nine in ten, with a substantial majority of students qualifying for free or reduced-price lunch, reflecting the economic profile of the Southside neighborhoods it serves.

On state testing, the school shows markedly low proficiency in math across the tested grades. In sixth grade, where testing data is available in full, about one in six students tested at proficient or above in math. That rate falls sharply in seventh grade to around one in eleven, and in eighth grade to one in seventeen. English language arts proficiency is broader: fifth-grade students reach two in five proficient, sixth-graders about one in three, and eighth-graders closer to one in four. Lower grades (third and fourth) show proficiency rates in the low teens in ELA, though data for some of those grades in math are reported with very small tested counts, making those results less stable. Science proficiency is available only for eighth grade and stands at about one in six. The school's overall proficiency index places it in the bottom quartile relative to other districts in Bexar County.

The school carries an F accountability rating from the Texas Education Agency for 2024-2025, its first full ratings cycle as a newer institution. This is a direct measure families will encounter when comparing charter options in San Antonio. A parent may want to look into further with the school what instructional changes are planned in response.

The school's enrollment is small relative to the broader district context, around a few hundred students spread across nine grades in an elementary-to-middle configuration. The site is in a mid-income to lower-income zip code on the Southside where median home values are moderately below the state benchmark and median rents show similar positioning. The housing market in this area reflects broader San Antonio growth pressure, which has made the city one of the nation's fastest-growing metro areas, though that growth is concentrated in northern and western suburbs; the Southside neighborhood remains historically working-class.

Royal Academy is a place where families are choosing an alternative to the traditional district, betting on a newer school and a project-based pedagogy tailored to whole-child development. The trade-off is that the school is still very young, lacks a track record of sustained performance gains, and shows weak results on state assessments across both tested subjects and grade bands. For families in the immediate neighborhood seeking a choice option and valuing free supports and a nontraditional instructional approach, the school presents that offer. For families comparing it to other charter or traditional public options in San Antonio, the academic profile and recent accountability rating are material considerations.

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Academic performance

How students perform on state tests, by grade, set against the district.

Math

Grade 615%

School 15% · District 15%

▼ 19 pts below state median · ▼ 16 pts below county median

Grade 79%

School 9% · District 9%

▼ 18 pts below state median · ▼ 5 pts below county median

Grade 86%

School 6% · District 6%

▼ 36 pts below state median · ▼ 19 pts below county median

English language arts

Grade 321%

School 21% · District 21%

▼ 25 pts below state median · ▼ 17 pts below county median

Grade 416%

School 16% · District 16%

▼ 33 pts below state median · ▼ 26 pts below county median

Grade 540%

School 40% · district not reported

▼ 14 pts below state median · ▼ 9 pts below county median

Grade 637%

School 37% · District 37%

▼ 15 pts below state median · ▼ 7 pts below county median

Grade 715%

School 15% · District 15%

▼ 34 pts below state median · ▼ 28 pts below county median

Grade 828%

School 28% · District 28%

▼ 27 pts below state median · ▼ 19 pts below county median

Science

Grade 817%

School 17% · District 17%

▼ 25 pts below state median · ▼ 18 pts below county median

Social studies

Grade 86%

School 6% · District 6%

▼ 18 pts below state median · ▼ 12 pts below county median

This schoolROYAL PUBLIC SCHOOLS, same grade

Graduation rate (ACGR) reflects the federally published Adjusted Cohort Graduation Rate for the most recent year available. We refresh this data annually at the close of each academic year in June. The federal source publishes a banded rate (for example, "90-94%") instead of an exact number for cohorts small enough to risk identifying individual students. The state distribution chart, where shown, plots every school in the state with a published rate or band; schools whose rate is federally suppressed are excluded. Where the federal source publishes a band rather than an exact rate, the school is placed within its band using a stable, ID-derived offset, so its position is consistent across visits.