City Heights Preparatory Charter: No single number tells this school's story. Here's the honest picture.
City Heights Preparatory Charter posts 9% meeting the standard and 0.0% exceeding it, against 39% and 16.8% statewide. The gaps and the bright spots below are the real read.
| Scope | % Exceeded | % Met+ | Growth | Absence | Suspension | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| This school | 31 | 0% | 9% | +2.1 | 28.5% | 3.1% |
| CA average · Middle School | 43 | 17% | 39% | +1.5 | 18.5% | 3.7% |
City Heights Preparatory Charter scores 31 of 100 on SchoolScope's Scope Score — the 27th percentile of 2,238 California middle schools (CDE CAASPP 2025).
Measures test performance, attendance, and climate — not arts, community, or your kid. How we score →
🌱 Building Momentum — This label means the data doesn't clearly sort the school one way or the other — ask what the school is proud of, and what it's working on.
Most rating sites would stop at “9% proficient” and call it done. City Heights Preparatory Charter deserves a closer read. The school sits in San Diego, where nearly all students qualify for free or reduced lunch — and reading the numbers without that context misreads the school.
As a charter, City Heights Preparatory Charter enrolls by application rather than address. That changes how you get in, but it doesn't change the score.
The seven-year arc
Climbed from the 15th to the 27th percentile of California middle schools since 2019.
This school hasn't fully recovered from the pandemic: 9% meet the standard today, versus 25% in 2019 — a gap worth asking about on a visit.
| Grade | 2019 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 6 | 32% | 10% | 12% | 18% | 5% |
| Grade 7 | 29% | 28% | 13% | 7% | 22% |
| Grade 8 | 39% | 25% | 21% | 21% | 14% |
| Grade 11 | — | — | 35% | 29% | — |
| Grade | 2019 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 6 | 21% | 0% | 0% | 9% | 5% |
| Grade 7 | 14% | 22% | 4% | 7% | 8% |
| Grade 8 | 16% | 0% | 8% | 8% | 0% |
| Grade 11 | — | — | 0% | 4% | — |
The story this school is actually telling
The school, grade by grade
ELA · CAASPP 2024–25Different students, same year — each bar is one grade's proficiency mix.
The honest read: the share exceeding holds steady across grades; the floor rises 9.3pp. The state average falls 0.5pp over the same span. A school visit and conversation with teachers will tell you more than this number.
The 5 things our score weighs
Ask what the school is working on next. Strong numbers tell you where a school is, not where it's going.
- Ask how the school follows up when a student starts missing days — chronic absence often starts outside the classroom, not inside it.
- Ask whether the tour can step into a working classroom — watch how the teacher handles a student who's stuck.
- Ask to tour while school's in session, and notice how hallways and transitions feel — culture shows up between classes, not just in them.
- Ask how the school communicates with families when a child starts to struggle.
- Ask what a typical day looks like for a new student in the first few weeks.
How every group of students does here
At City Heights Preparatory Charter in San Diego, 14.2% of low-income students met or exceeded the ELA standard in 2025, compared to 42.6% district-wide and 38.2% statewide. City Heights Preparatory Charter trails its district average for low-income students by 28.4 percentage points in ELA. Other subgroups: Low-Income students (4.1% Math proficient); Hispanic students (22.7% ELA proficient). The largest proficiency gap is 7.0 percentage points for english learner students. Data source: California Department of Education, CAASPP 2024-25. 72 students tested.
6 of 12 student groups here are too small to report — a privacy protection, not a gap.
Change in proficiency from the lowest tested grade — which groups gain ground the longer they stay. Groups with fewer than 10 tested students per grade are not shown.
Low-income student ELA proficiency rises by 9.3pp from grade 6 to grade 8 at this school. District average: +0.8pp.
Showing up, and staying in class
Where the path goes
City Heights Preparatory Charter serves grades 6-12 — students can complete middle and high school here, without a separate middle-to-high transition.
The people teaching here
Pay is set by the district, not the school.
What gets spent here
The district's current expense of education per student, from CDE's annual SACS filing — the freshest district spending figure the state publishes.
District-level, from the district's own SACS general-ledger filing — school-by-school breakdowns aren't published by the state.
Source: NCES F-33 · Full district breakdown →
The neighborhood it serves
Source: U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 5-year estimates (2024) · ZIP-level
At 160 students, this school is much smaller than the typical California middle school (≈860).
On the state's science test (CAST), 9% met or exceeded the standard — science is tested in grades 5 and 8 but never enters the Scope Score.
Frequently asked questions
Is City Heights Preparatory Charter a good middle school?
What are City Heights Preparatory Charter's CAASPP test scores?
How does City Heights Preparatory Charter rank in California?
Is City Heights Preparatory Charter getting better or worse?
What is the attendance and school culture like at City Heights Preparatory Charter?
How does City Heights Preparatory Charter compare to other schools in San Diego?
How does City Heights Preparatory Charter serve low-income and underrepresented students?
Your other options
Nearby Middle Schools
3 within ~3 mi · avg 42
Nearby Elementary Schools
3 within ~3 mi · avg 66
Private alternatives nearby
Private schools within ~10 miles. These schools do not participate in state testing and cannot be scored or ranked.
A low score doesn't tell the whole story. Read: Your School Scored Low — Here's What That Actually Means
Every number on this page
Score factors, grade-level breakdowns, subgroup proficiency, and peer comparisons.
| ELA | Tested | EXC | MET | NEAR | NOT | MET+ | +/CA |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 6 | 20 | 0% | 5% | 15% | 80% | 5% | −42 |
| Grade 7 | 23 | 0% | 22% | 17% | 61% | 22% | −26 |
| Grade 8 | 28 | 0% | 14% | 29% | 57% | 14% | −32 |
| Grade 11 | 10 | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Math | Tested | EXC | MET | NEAR | NOT | MET+ | +/CA |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 6 | 20 | 0% | 5% | 30% | 65% | 5% | −30 |
| Grade 7 | 25 | 0% | 8% | 36% | 56% | 8% | −26 |
| Grade 8 | 28 | 0% | 0% | 36% | 64% | 0% | −32 |
| Grade 11 | 10 | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Science (CAST) | Tested | EXC | MET | NEAR | NOT |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grade 5/8/11 | 45 | 0% | 9% | 60% | 31% |
CAST is tested in grades 5, 8, and once in high school — not annually. Not part of the Scope Score.
| Subgroup · ELA | Tested | MET+ | vs district | vs CA |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Socioeconomically Disadvantaged | 72 | 14.2% | −28 | −24 |
| Hispanic/Latino | 22 | 22.7% | −18 | −16 |
| English Learners | 15 | 6.7% | −2 | −4 |
| School | Dist | Scope | EXC | MET+ | Growth | Susp |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| City Heights Preparatory Charter ← | — | 31 | 0.0% | 9.0% | +2.1 | 3.1% |
| Magnolia Science Academy San Diego | 2.6 mi | 66 | 36.6% | 66.3% | +5.7 | 2.0% |
| Mann Middle | 0.2 mi | 31 | 7.8% | 22.5% | +1.1 | 3.5% |
| Wilson Middle | 1.9 mi | 29 | 6.7% | 22.9% | +1.4 | 3.2% |
| California average | — | 43 | 16.8% | 39.3% | +1.5 | 3.7% |
| Year | Scope | Pctile | Rank | Exc | Met+ | Absent | Susp | Growth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 | 25 | 15 | #1712 | 4.1% | 25.2% | 14.9% | 4.3% | +0.6pp |
| 2022 | 21 | 9 | #1963 | 3.6% | 14.1% | 33.2% | 7.6% | +7.7pp |
| 2023 | 40 | 49 | #1104 | 3.5% | 9.8% | 22.6% | 4.7% | +8.6pp |
| 2024 | 29 | 28 | #1599 | 1.4% | 11.6% | 24.1% | 2.1% | +0.9pp |
| 2025 | 31 | 27 | #1643 | 0.0% | 9.0% | 28.5% | 3.1% | +2.1pp |
- — Scored here as a middle school — other grade spans appear in the data appendix.
- — Low-income students here trail the state average for their group by 24 points in ELA — worth asking how the school is closing that gap.
SchoolScope scores and verdicts are our interpretation of public California Department of Education data — independent analysis, not an official rating. How we analyze · Request a correction