Washington Yu Ying Public Charter School
Programs and results
What we aim to solve
Our programs
What are the organization's current programs, how do they measure success, and who do the programs serve?
Washington Yu Ying Public Charter School
Washington Yu Ying PCS (Yu Ying) is a revolutionary school that is on the leading edge of elementary education by combining a Chinese language immersion program with the state-of-the-art International Baccalaureate curriculum framework. Translated, Yu Ying means "nurturing excellence."
In January 2008, Yu Ying was granted its charter by the District of Columbia Public Charter School Board. When the school opened its doors to 130 students in September 2008, it was the only school of its kind, public or private, in the city and wider metropolitan area.
That group of students, representing Pre-K, Kindergarten and First Grade, were the first to experience Yu Ying's innovative Chinese language immersion program: Students learn all subjects in both languages. Each day they alternate between their Chinese and English classrooms and experience the curriculum frameworks represented by the IB Primary Years and Middle Years Programmes. Each classroom is staffed with a Lead and an Assistant teacher and all Chinese and English teachers are native speakers.
The student population at Yu Ying is as diverse as the District of Columbia itself. Hailing from all 8 Wards in the city, Yu Ying students are:
34.2% African American
31.43% Caucasian
9.67% Asian
5.18% Hispanic
19.52% Multiracial
Where we work
Awards
National Green Ribbon School Award 2013
Department of Education
IBO World School 2013
International Baccalaureate Organization
DC's Best Elementary School 2013
DC City Paper Readership
DC's Best Elementary School 2015
DC City Paper Readership
Reauthorization as an IBO World School 2017
International Baccalaureate Organization
Affiliations & memberships
Combined Federal Campaign 2016
Combined Federal Campaign 2017
Combined Federal Campaign 2018
Combined Federal Campaign 2021
External reviews
Photos
Videos
Our results
How does this organization measure their results? It's a hard question but an important one.
Evaluation documents
Download evaluation reportsNumber of teachers retained after 12 months
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Related Program
Washington Yu Ying Public Charter School
Type of Metric
Output - describing our activities and reach
Direction of Success
Increasing
Context Notes
Yu Ying has a high teacher retention rate. The numbers are percentages. For example, in 2022, 91% of Yu Ying's teachers remained at the school. In 2023, 85% returned for the 2023-2024 school year.
Number of students at or above a 90% attendance rate
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Related Program
Washington Yu Ying Public Charter School
Type of Metric
Outcome - describing the effects on people or issues
Direction of Success
Holding steady
Context Notes
Yu Ying's student attendance rate has been over 95% for the past five years.
Number of teachers involved in school-wide decisions about student learning
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Type of Metric
Outcome - describing the effects on people or issues
Direction of Success
Increasing
Context Notes
At the end of every school year, Yu Ying reviews the years' academic lessons learned with instructional staff. Staff input is used to determine academic focus areas for the upcoming school year.
Goals & Strategy
Learn about the organization's key goals, strategies, capabilities, and progress.
Charting impact
Four powerful questions that require reflection about what really matters - results.
What is the organization aiming to accomplish?
1) Utilize the International Baccalaureate curriculum framework to engage students in an exploratory, inquiry-based learning environment.
2) Improve student outcomes on mandated, system-wide testing.
3) Increase student proficiency in Mandarin Chinese, Math, and English as measured on internal oral and written comprehension examinations.
What are the organization's key strategies for making this happen?
1) The International Baccalaureate curriculum framework aims to develop the whole child both in the classroom and in the world outside. Yu Ying uses this transdisciplinary, inquiry-based framework to assist the students in making real world connections to their learning and become independent, principled thinkers.
2) The school has actively worked to align Yu Ying's curriculum to the Common Core Standards for K-12 education in order to improve student outcomes for both local and federally mandated testing. While the school does not “teach to the test", the skills that are measured by these tests are built into the everyday curriculum. Additionally, the school is afforded the ability to receive annual scores on these tests, then reflect on the results and adjust our approach as necessary.
3) Yu Ying employs two main tactics to increase students' proficiency in Mandarin Chinese. The first is through horizontal and vertical articulation of Chinese language arts, which is based on the American College for the Teaching of Foreign Languages' (ACTFL) standards. The second is through partial immersion, in which students learn all subjects in both English and Mandarin Chinese, on alternating days. Additionally, teachers use incentives to encourage students to increase the amount of Chinese they speak in the Chinese classroom and the school works to provide authentic opportunities for students to interact with native speakers - including providing families with information to travel to China the summer after Grade 5.
What are the organization's capabilities for doing this?
Yu Ying is well-positioned to achieve our goals. Financially, Yu Ying has been in a strong position since inception. Each year, Yu Ying has expanded our cash reserve and looked for new sources of funding to support and expand programing. In 2010 we successfully financed the purchase of a 30,000 square foot building and accompanying 3 acre lot for our permanent home. During the purchase of the building, Yu Ying was able to leverage a strong financial standing to secure millions in loans and bonds from the DC government.
In addition to increasingly strong financials, Yu Ying's staff and enrollment has grown with each passing year. In 2008, Yu Ying opened with 22 staff and 130 students from PreK to 1st grade. By the second year, the staff grew to 35 and the student body grew to about 230. Interest in Yu Ying's program has grown exponentially as well. For our upcoming school year, we received 1079 applications for 92 spots.
Yu Ying's expertise in the field has also grown in 11 years of operation. We are now a full elementary school (PreK through 5th) and we have received recognition for our good work. Yu Ying is an International Baccalaureate Organization (IBO) World School, a status conferred after undergoing a multi-year review process with the IBO. Additionally, Yu Ying is a 2013 Department of Education Green Ribbon School and has been awarded “Tier 1" status from the DC Public Charter School Board (PCSB) for seven years in a row. Yu Ying has achieved this ranking by consistently meeting all academic and non-academic performance targets on the PCSB’s Performance Management Framework.
What have they accomplished so far and what's next?
Yu Ying has met all of it's PCSB annual goals since our first year and has done well on state standardized testing. On the 2019 PARCC assessment, 57.4% of Yu Ying 3rd to 5th grade students performed on or above grade level in Math and 55.9% performed on or above grade level in Reading. These results are impressive because the PARCC does not measure student proficiency in other languages, so Yu Ying students are performing above the state average, while learning core content in a second language.
The school continues to build valuable partnerships and apply for funding that can help us improve our program and share with other public schools in our network. In 2012, Yu Ying applied for and received a $200,000 grant from the Office of the State Superintendent of Education (OSSE), to share expertise and Chinese resources with the 3 DC public elementary schools that offer Chinese. Other honors include:
● 2009 Department of Education FLAP Grantee: $873,927 allowed Yu Ying to create Chinese assessments & high-quality resources for immersion and inquiry-based learning. ● 2013 & 2015-2018 City Paper “Best of DC: Best Elementary School." ● 2015 Hanban Confucius Classroom of the Year. Ten out of 1,000 schools worldwide were honored for excellence in instruction, curriculum and cultural richness. ● 2010 to 2019 Presenters at the National Chinese Language Conference. ● 2015 SSOS Best Practices Grantee: $244,458 to share best practices in teaching literacy through inquiry. ● 2016 - 2019 SOAR Act Grantee: Grants to increase math and reading proficiency for low-performing and low-income students. 2016 Whole Kids Grantee to create a Community Compost Collective ● America’s Healthiest Schools 2018 ● 2017 Charter Schools Program Dissemination Grantee: $ 226,200 to implement trauma informed best practices ● 2017 School Garden Grantee - $30,000 to build a Food Forest.
We have seen great successes with our Mandarin immersion program, but most Yu Ying parents are unable to speak the language at home and students' time using the language can be limited. We have worked to offset this issue with a number of resources created in house and shared with parents through our online “Parent Portal". These include audio and written materials that allow bilingual students to practice curriculum-matched, leveled Mandarin content while at home with their non-bilingual parents. We have also increased speaking opportunities in and out of the classroom - through Chinese “speaking bees" and trips to China and Flushing, NY.
There is concern that the school is not able to fulfill the growing demand for our program. While we have increased the number of seats available, the school has been asked to begin looking at how we may replicate our program. In the interim, we have developed services and products to help other schools create and strengthen their Chinese classes.
How we listen
Seeking feedback from people served makes programs more responsive and effective. Here’s how this organization is listening.
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How is your organization using feedback from the people you serve?
To identify and remedy poor client service experiences, To identify bright spots and enhance positive service experiences, To make fundamental changes to our programs and/or operations, To inform the development of new programs/projects, To identify where we are less inclusive or equitable across demographic groups, To strengthen relationships with the people we serve
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Which of the following feedback practices does your organization routinely carry out?
We collect feedback from the people we serve at least annually, We take steps to get feedback from marginalized or under-represented people, We act on the feedback we receive
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What challenges does the organization face when collecting feedback?
We don't have any major challenges to collecting feedback
Financials
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Operations
The people, governance practices, and partners that make the organization tick.
Connect with nonprofit leaders
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- Analyze a variety of pre-calculated financial metrics
- Access beautifully interactive analysis and comparison tools
- Compare nonprofit financials to similar organizations
Want to see how you can enhance your nonprofit research and unlock more insights? Learn More about GuideStar Pro.
Connect with nonprofit leaders
SubscribeBuild relationships with key people who manage and lead nonprofit organizations with GuideStar Pro. Try a low commitment monthly plan today.
- Analyze a variety of pre-calculated financial metrics
- Access beautifully interactive analysis and comparison tools
- Compare nonprofit financials to similar organizations
Want to see how you can enhance your nonprofit research and unlock more insights? Learn More about GuideStar Pro.
Washington Yu Ying Public Charter School
Board of directorsas of 01/18/2024
Lemar White
Term: 2023 - 2029
Gordon Fletcher
Commissioner, ANC5A08
Jessica Sutter
EdPro Consulting, LLC
DeWayne McClary
engage2learn
Robert Anderson
OFFICE OF THE UNITED STATES TRADE REPRESENTATIVE (USTR)
Paige Hoffman
Deputy Chief, School Improvement at District of Columbia Public Schools
Jay Chen
Fannie Mae
Darren Riley
Riley Trade Law PLLC
LeMar White
Wendy Rueda
National Cancer Institute
Marcus Hurley
Mark G Anderson Consultants
Cosabeth Bullock
Founder, Little Thing
Quinton Ng
Chartered Financial Analyst
Liza Douglas
American Heart Association
Board leadership practices
GuideStar worked with BoardSource, the national leader in nonprofit board leadership and governance, to create this section.
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Board orientation and education
Does the board conduct a formal orientation for new board members and require all board members to sign a written agreement regarding their roles, responsibilities, and expectations? Yes -
CEO oversight
Has the board conducted a formal, written assessment of the chief executive within the past year ? Yes -
Ethics and transparency
Have the board and senior staff reviewed the conflict-of-interest policy and completed and signed disclosure statements in the past year? Yes -
Board composition
Does the board ensure an inclusive board member recruitment process that results in diversity of thought and leadership? Yes -
Board performance
Has the board conducted a formal, written self-assessment of its performance within the past three years? Yes
Organizational demographics
Who works and leads organizations that serve our diverse communities? Candid partnered with CHANGE Philanthropy on this demographic section.
Leadership
The organization's leader identifies as:
Race & ethnicity
Gender identity
Transgender Identity
Sexual orientation
No data
Disability
No data
Equity strategies
Last updated: 07/08/2020GuideStar partnered with Equity in the Center - an organization that works to shift mindsets, practices, and systems to increase racial equity - to create this section. Learn more
- We ask team members to identify racial disparities in their programs and / or portfolios.
- We analyze disaggregated data and root causes of race disparities that impact the organization's programs, portfolios, and the populations served.
- We disaggregate data to adjust programming goals to keep pace with changing needs of the communities we support.
- We employ non-traditional ways of gathering feedback on programs and trainings, which may include interviews, roundtables, and external reviews with/by community stakeholders.
- We disaggregate data by demographics, including race, in every policy and program measured.
- We seek individuals from various race backgrounds for board and executive director/CEO positions within our organization.
- We have community representation at the board level, either on the board itself or through a community advisory board.
- We help senior leadership understand how to be inclusive leaders with learning approaches that emphasize reflection, iteration, and adaptability.