Blairsville-Saltsburg School District
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Blairsville-Saltsburg School District is a rural school district in the state of Pennsylvania. The district serves Burrell and Black Lick Townships, and the towns of Blairsville and Black Lick in Indiana County at the Blairsville campus in Burrell Township. The other half of the district consists of Conemaugh Township and Saltsburg in Indiana County, and Loyalhanna Township in Westmoreland County at Saltsburg.
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[edit] Schools
[edit] Blairsville Elementary School
Blairsville Elementary School is located in Burrell Township, Indiana County at the junctions of US Route 22 and Route 119. The school shares a thirty-six acre campus with Blairsville Middle School, Blairsville High School, and the BSSD Central Administrative Offices.
BES serves students in grades K through 5. The school contains a library, computer lab, spacious classrooms, and specially designated areas for music, art, and physical education.
[edit] Blairsville Middle School
Blairsville Middle School is a 6-8 school located at 104 School Lane at the Blairsville campus. The school is located in the east wing of the Middle/High School building and shares the building with the High School and district administrative offices. The gym in the middle school is the main venue for Blairsville High School sports, as it holds more fans than its high school counterpart.
[edit] Blairsville High School
Blairsville High School is a 9-12 school located on the Blairsville campus. There are about 450 students. The school is located in the west half of the building and adjacent to district administrative offices. The school also contains the Blairsville Performing Arts Center, a 600 seat theater. The high school also provides several opportunities for academically-talented students to excel. A total of six weighted Advanced Placement courses are offered: AP Chemistry, AP World History, AP United States History, AP Calculus AB, AP Physics C: Mechanics, and AP English Literature. Further, various faculty members are making efforts to add additional courses to the AP curriculum. For instance, some teachers in the social studies department have considered attemping to add a AP United States Government and Politics course. Students may also elect to self-study material for AP exams; some students select to study AP Calculus BC independently after completing the AB course during their junior year.
[edit] Saltsburg Elementary School
The Saltsburg Elementary School is located 250 Third Street in Saltsburg. It currently serves grades K through 6.
As part of the district consolidation plan, Saltsburg Elementary will be closed. The elementary students will be moved to the larger building that currently functions as the Saltsburg Middle-High School.
[edit] Saltsburg Middle-High School
Saltsburg Middle-High School is a 7-12 grade school located at 84 Trojan Lane in Saltsburg. Located next to the school is the football field with a 6-lane running track. This facility is the home of Saltsburg Trojan football, as well as Blairsville-Saltsburg track. The stadium also contains the only bandstand in Indiana County, Pennsylvania. During the summer of 2006, it was discovered that the building had developed a termite infestation, contributing to arguments that the school should be closed. [1]
Saltsburg Junior/Senior High School
[edit] Post-Secondary Education in the BSSD
Most graduated students go on to some sort of post-secondary institution. The most popular colleges include Indiana University of Pennsylvania, which is located nearby, other state-system universities such as Clarion and Slippery Rock, theUniversity of Pittsburgh, Penn State University, Saint Vincent College, Saint Francis University, Washington & Jefferson College, and Duquesne University. Other students in recent years have attended Juniata College, Carnegie Mellon University, Chatham College, Dickinson College, Temple University, the University of Pennsylvania, Colgate University, Johns Hopkins University, Virginia Tech, the US Naval Academy, New York University, and Arizona State University. Most students who do not go on to attend a four year institution will attend a technical or other speciality school or serve in a branch of the military.
[edit] Athletics
The district offers a variety of sports at the varsity level. Many of the districts teams are combined, with their home location at either Blairsville or Saltsburg. In recent years, the Board of Directors has combined more sports to prepare for anticipated consolidation of the school district to one high school. The following sports teams are for the 2006-2007 school year (with classifications) [2]:
- Blairsville: Football (A), Boys Basketball (AA), Girls Basketball (A)
- Saltsburg: Football (A), Boys Basketball (A), Girls Basketball (A)
- Co-op(open to both Blairsville and Saltsburg students): Cross Country (AA), Wrestling (AA), Track & Field (AA), Baseball (AA), Softball (AA), Girls Volleyball (AA), Golf
- Note: The PIAA classifications for the 2006-2008 school years have Blairsville and Saltsburg volleyball and softball teams listed as two A teams. Since the publication of these classifications, the school board voted to consolidate these programs, which would create a single AA team, rather than two A teams in each sport.
All teams compete in the Heritage Conference of the PIAA-District 6. The district's boys basketball teams have dominated District 6A for the past several years. Saltsburg won the District title in 2000, 2002, and 2003, followed by Blairsville championships in 2005 and 2006. The cross country and track & field teams have had good showings at the county and district levels, and have sent numerous participants to the state competition.
[edit] Memorial Field
The district owns and maintains a football stadium in the town of Blairsville which hosts all Blairsville Middle and High School home football games. The stadium seats about 2000-2500 spectators. The stadium has held upwards of 3000 people in standing-room-only crowds during several Homecoming games, games versus Saltsburg, and recent playoff games.
[edit] School Board of Directors
- Superintendent: Arnold J. Nadonley
- Solicitor: Ronald J. Saffron
- Business Manager: Eric Kocsis
- Director of Education: Theresa Hanley
- Board Secretary(non-voting): Leigh A. Free
[edit] Board Members
- Lance P. Alexander - Blairsville
- Paul A. Bell - Blairsville
- Linda Brown - Saltsburg
- Dan Speal - Saltsburg
- George L. Rowley - Burrell Township
- Karen Shusko - Saltsburg
- B. Edward Smith - Blairsville
- Mary J. Whitfield - Burrell Township
(see below for an explanation of the legal actions leading to a new composition of the school board)
[edit] Consolidation
At a meeting on August 21, 2006, the nine members of the school board, including three from Saltsburg, voted 9-0 on a plan to consolidate the entire school district. The consolidation plan will bus students in grades 7 through 12 to the Blairsville campus. The current Blairsville Middle-High School building will be renovated in order to hold the students from Saltsburg. Blairsville students grades K-6 will attend Blairsville Elementary, which will see some minor renovations. Students of the same age in Saltsburg will attend school in the current Saltsburg Middle-High School, which will be converted and renovated to serve the younger students. In all, an estimated 9.5 teaching jobs district-wide would be eliminated, many through early retirement plans. The plan is set to go into effect at the start of the 2010-2011 school year.
[edit] Saltsburg Opposition
Many residents of Saltsburg responded to the plans with mass criticism. They protested at several meetings about the safety concerns with operating buses between Saltsburg and Blairsville on Route 22. They also argued that removing the school from the town (Saltsburg) can damage the small town's economy. In early September 2006, the Save Our Schools group filed a lawsuit against the school board of directors, claiming that the board made rash decisions and did not study any other options before voting for consolidation. The SOS group did not fair as well as anticipated in the Indiana County court. When addressing the issue of representation on the school board, the judge realigned several voting districts. The overall composition will not be as divided as in the past, but certain new regions will consist of households in both the Blairsville and the Saltsburg service areas. The likelihood that a Blairsville resident will represent Saltsburg is not a good result for the anti-consolidation advocates. Recently, the organization asked the Saltsburg Borough Council to fund $30,000 for unpaid fees to their lawyer.
