Eva Moskowitz wants to fix a really big problem. There are over a million kids in New York City’s public schools. Most can’t read or do math at grade level. Many won’t graduate on time. And it’s largely poor, black and brown kids who are stuck in the lowest performing schools. Eva’s the founder and CEO of Success Academy, the subject of this season of StartUp. And she’s actually making progress.

Based on the Success chairman of the Network Board, Steven Galbraith, knows there’s a major cognitive dissonance among both our political detractors and supporters. More than 94% of Success Academy scholars are of color. They come from all five boroughs. The median annual income of our families is under $45.000. Of our seven-person leadership team, six—including CEO Eva Moskowitz—are women, and 46% of our teachers are minorities, compared with less than 20% nationally. Collectively, the Success community could hardly be described as the prototypical beneficiary of radical right-wing politics.

The Foundation for Excellence in Education (ExcelinEd) announced today that Eva Moskowitz, the founder and CEO of Success Academy Charter Schools, will be honored at the 2018 National Summit on Education Reform on Friday, December 7 in Washington, D.C.

At a rally Thursday morning, Success Academy officials said Mayor Bill de Blasio has drastically curbed charter-school accommodations in city buildings. A total of 150 charter school co-locations were approved between 2009 and 2013. Under de Blasio, that number dipped sharply to 54 between 2014 and this year.

Educators from California, Connecticut, DC, Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Texas, Tennessee and Wisconsin convened yesterday for a deep dive on middle school literacy at the Robertson Center at Success Academy, a new accelerator for advancing the work of teachers and administrators across the country.

The real takeaway from the state test results is the continued superior performance of children attending public charter schools. In the city, 57 percent of African-American charter students scored proficient in English vs. 34 percent in the regular public schools. In math, it was 58,6 percent vs. 25,4 percent.

Two Success Academy charter schools won the federal ‘Blue Ribbon’ status for 2018. The status is awarded annually to schools that have test scores in the top 15 percent in their state and no significant gaps among students from different demographics, or that have shown “extraordinary progress” in closing those gaps.

Eight New York City schools were awarded the coveted title of National Blue Ribbon School Monday by the U.S. Department of Education, including Success Academy Bed-Stuy 1 and Success Academy Harlem 2.

It means something that kids are excelling at many of the city’s independently run public schools, which overwhelmingly serve low-income blacks and Latinos. Overall, charters outpaced district-run schools. At 37 Success Academy schools, 98% of kids passed state math tests; 91% passed English tests.