YES Prep Public Schools Continues Rapid Growth

(HOUSTON) -- YES Prep Public Schools this week began a rapid series of groundbreakings and ribbon cuttings at a total of five new elementary schools across Houston.

Breaking Ground

YES Prep — one of the fastest growing and highest performing public charter school systems in the country —broke ground on two new elementary schools set to open in August 2025. Both schools, located in predominately Hispanic neighborhoods in Southwest and Northwest Houston, aim to close gaps by providing access to high-quality, free, bilingual public education.

YES Prep Brays Oaks Elementary and YES Prep White Oak Elementary will welcome students in pre-kindergarten through second grade in 2025, adding grade levels each year to include third, fourth and fifth grades.

YES Prep Brays Oaks Elementary will be at 9060 Benning Rd., Houston, TX 77031 with Arch-Con as the general contractor. YES Prep White Oak Elementary will be at 6343 Deihl Rd., Houston, TX 77092.

Area families already are submitting enrollment interest forms for the Brays Oaks and White Oak campuses. The 2025-26 new student lottery opens this fall.

Closing Gaps

YES Prep started opening elementary schools in 2020 after decades of serving Houston children in grades 6-12. The district believes the sooner students start getting a high-quality education, the stronger their path to college will be.

According to the Child Opportunity Index 3.0, which measures social and environmental factors such as school quality, parent employment levels and more, Houston has one of the widest child opportunity gaps in the country and is among the worst three metros in the nation for “opportunity hoarding,” meaning children in some neighborhoods are less likely to graduate high school than their peers living just a couple miles away.

All YES Prep schools are in "very low" opportunity areas, per the Child Opportunity Index. The new YES Prep Brays Oaks Elementary will be in an area with 0% pre-K enrollment and a “very low” high school graduation rate. YES Prep White Oak Elementary is being constructed in a neighborhood where public pre-K enrollment is below average and critical elementary reading/math scores are lagging.

Ribbon Cuttings

YES Prep is opening a record three new schools for the first time this month and celebrating with ribbon-cutting ceremonies ahead of the new school year.

YES Prep's Hobby Elementary, North Rankin Elementary and Southwest Oaks Elementary are altogether opening their doors to more than 3,000 new students in pre-K through 2nd grade this year.

Like all of YES Prep’s elementary schools, these will offer a high-performing bilingual education program.

2024-2025 School Year

This school year, YES Prep will serve 20,000 students at 24 campuses — all in Houston. Seats at YES Prep’s other schools, including a record three brand new elementary schools celebrating ribbon cuttings and opening this month, are still available for the 2024-25 school year.

All YES Prep schools are tuition-free with no admission requirements. Every campus provides uniforms, meals, electronic devices, transportation, special education, English language learning and access to healthcare, mental health and other student support services.

Families interested in enrolling can visit www.yesprep.org.