CHARLESTON — Members of the West Virginia Professional Charter School Board received a briefing Thursday morning on the first comparable summative assessment results for the first group of public charter schools, a preview of enrollment, and approved a budget for the next fiscal year.

The state Department of Education released results of the Statewide Summative Assessment for the 2023-2024 school year last month.

The Statewide Summative Assessment looks at proficiency in math, English Language Arts and science. The results consist of the General Summative Assessment for grades three through eight, the SAT School Day Test for high school juniors and the Alternative Summative Assessment for grades three through eight and grade 11. There was 95% participation among the grades tested.

Only two of the state’s four physical public charter schools and the two statewide virtual charter schools were able to participate in the Statewide Summative Assessment for two years in a row since their creation of the public charter school pilot program in 2019 by the Legislature and updates to law in 2021 that created the Professional Charter School Board.

“These are very early trends because as you know, we have six authorized charter schools, and only four of them have been open for two years,” said the board’s executive director, James Paul. “There’s only four schools that have two years of data and only four schools that can have trends.”

According to the results presented to board members, the Morgantown-based West Virginia Academy and Eastern Panhandle Preparatory Academy in Kearneysville outperformed the statewide proficiency rates for public schools, while public schools outperformed the West Virginia Virtual Academy and Virtual Preparatory Academy.

According to the results calculated across all grades for the prior school year, the math proficiency rate for the West Virginia Academy was 40% for the 2023-2024 school year, up from 28% for the 2022-2023 school year. The Eastern Panhandle Preparatory Academy math proficiency rate was 44% last school year, up from 20% for the school’s first full year of operation.

For public schools, 36% of students tested were proficient in math last school year, up from 35% in the 2022-23 school. The math proficiency rate for the West Virginia Virtual Academy was 14% last year, up from 7% in the 2022-2023 school year. The Virtual Preparatory Academy had a math proficiency rate of 20% last school year, up from 14% the previous school year.

In ELA, the West Virginia Academy had a proficiency rating for the 2023-2024 school year of 55%, up from 47% in the 2022-2023 school year. The ELA rate for the Eastern Panhandle Preparatory Academy was 50% last school year, up from 46% the previous school year. ELA proficiency in public schools last school year was at 45%, up from 44% in 2022-23.

The West Virginia Virtual Academy had an ELA proficiency rate of 36% last school year, up from 23% the previous school year. And the Virtual Preparatory Academy had an ELA proficiency rate of 34% in the 2023-2024 school year, up from 24% in the previous school year.

“Note that these are school-level outcomes,” Paul said. “These data do not talk about individual student growth. There is some state data that is provided on individual student growth that is part of the Balanced Scorecard that the state puts out in September.”

“I immediately started thinking about the virtual and what might be happening is the students are adjusting to the instructional methodology being used and the strategies,” said board member Dewayne Duncan. “They’re showing growth, which is good. So maybe it’s just getting them in the groove and getting them used to it to see more growth on their part. But overall, they look good to me.”

Paul provided board members a preview of student enrollment in the state’s two statewide virtual public charter schools. During the previous school year, the state’s public charter school system had 2,270 students. While official enrollment for the 2024-2025 school year will not be certified until Oct. 1, the estimated student enrollment for this fall is approximately 3,300 students, with 80% of students enrolled in the two statewide virtual charter schools.

“Again, this is unofficial with about 80% of those students in the two virtual schools, which are continuing to grow at a very impressive rate and continuing to be an extremely popular option for parents in our state,” Paul said.

Certified student enrollment determines the amount of public funding charter schools received in the next school year. While charters are considered public schools the same as a county-administered K-12 school, charters do not receive their state funding at the same level as traditional county public schools.

The public charter school pilot program allows 99% of the per-pupil funding from the state school aid funding formula to follow the student to the public charter school, but that funding is paid out one year in arrears in December of each year and is based on fall enrollment numbers that are not finalized until October of each year.

The board also approved a budget proposal for fiscal year 2026 general revenue budget beginning in July 2025. The budget proposal, which will be included in the state Department of Education’s budget proposal that will be presented to lawmakers in 2025 by the next governor, keeps the PCSB budget flat at $3.1 million.

The charter school board’s budget includes three funding streams: a federal funding stream thanks to the $12.2 million awarded to the board last year over five years through the U.S. Department of Education’s Expanding Opportunity Through Quality Charter Schools program; the West Virginia Charter School Stimulus Fund to help with public charter school startup costs, which has yet to be funded by the Legislature; and the $3.1 million operational budget approved Thursday.

Wednesday was the first day of school for the most recent public charter school, the Clarksburg Classical Academy. The M.E.C.C.A. Business Learning Institute in Charles Town will begin in the fall of 2025.

The board also received an application last month for the Wisdom Academy, that wants to start a K-12 public charter school in the Morgantown area. The school will start off as a K-6 school and add a new grade every year. Charter school board staff will begin an interview process with representatives of the Wisdom Academy, which includes a public forum and comment period, and an analysis of the application, with an opportunity for the school to amend their application based on the analysis and public feedback.