Shikellamy School District

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Shikellamy School District is a public school district in Northumberland County, Pennsylvania. It serves Northumberland Borough, Point Township, Rockefeller Township, Snydertown Borough, the City of Sunbury, and Upper Augusta Township with 4 elementary schools, two middle schools, and one high school.

The admistrative offices are located at Administration Center, 200 Island Blvd, Sunbury, Pennsylvania. Shikellamy High School. The graduation rate fell to 78% according to the district's report card 2006-2007. In 11th grade, 49% of students were proficient in math. For reading 62% of students were proficient in 2005-2006. The high school is ranked 384th out of 606 public high schools in Pennsylvania.

In 2007, the Pittsburgh Business Times ranked the Shikellamy School District 434th out of 499 Pennsylvania school districts based on three years of Pennsylvania System of Student Assessment test scores. [1]

Dr. Alan Lonoconus, Superintendent of the Shikellamy School District, in a December 2007 interview on Leaders and Lawmakers said, "Where I envision us going is a lot of new curriculum revisions. With the State standards and everything we have to do with the state and Federal No Child Left Behind regulations, we have to really ramp up what we are doing."[2]

The Shikellamy School Board set the budget at $34.62 million for 2007-2008. The board levies a variety of taxes to support its programs. Taxes include 62.5 mills real estate tax in 2007. [3] Per capita taxes are $5 per resident. An occupational tax, which charges a set amount based on your job title, earns approximately $1.7 million. Many see this tax as particularly unfair, as people classified in the same job title often earn vastly different amounts but have to pay the same amount. An earned income taxes of one-half of 1 percent of income yields a revenue of approximately $1.8 million. Additionally, the real estate transfer tax of one-half percent(Nothumberland borough, Point Township, Rockefeller Township) and one percent (Snydertown borough) is levied on real estate transfers.[4]

Voters rejected a tax referendum in May 2007 which would have increased local earned income tax by 0.5 percent to reduce property taxes for homeowners and farmers by $176.[5]

The district's policy is that if proficiency is not achieved on PSSAs, a retest will be administered during the senior year for deficient subject areas. Failure to achieve proficiency in the retest requires a passing grade on a final examination and a passing course grade for any and all deficient subject areas reported by the Pennsylvania System of School Assessment. The student must pass both the course and the final examination in order to graduate. If a student fails to show evidence of this proficiency, the student can achieve a Shikellamy diploma by passing a summer school course or by returning for an additional school year to achieve a passing grade.

The curriculum is currently under revision to align it with the 1999 Pennsylvania Academic Standards. These standards are assessed in the third through eighth and eleventh grades under the guise of the Pennsylvania System of School Assessment. These tests last several days and cover Reading, Writing, Speaking, Mathematics and Science.

Revision of the Shikellamy School District's mathematics curriculum, to bring it into compliance with Chapter 4 regulations of 2000, is to begin in fall 2007.[6]

In 2007, Shikellamy School District was awarded two state grants to improve the education of their high school students. The administration announced the receipt of a three year Project 720 grant of $270,000. [7] Some of these dollars will be used to revise the graduation project to include a career component. The district was also awarded a $339,000 grant to infuse technology into the core curriculum of the high school.[8] The Classrooms for the Future grant provides laptop computers for english, math, science and social studies classrooms.[9] Additionally, the state will cover the salary of a part time teacher technology coach whose role is to assist the teachers in using the equipment and software effectively to improve their instruction.

Contents

[edit] Schools

[edit] Secondary Schools

[edit] High Schools

[edit] Middle Schools

  • C.W. Rice Middle School
  • Sunbury Middle School

[edit] Primary Schools

[edit] Elementary Schools

  • Beck Elementary School
  • Chief Shikellamy Elementary School
  • Oaklyn Elementary School
  • Priestley Elementary School

[edit] References

  1. ^ Valley schools all over the chart, Daily Item June 6, 2007 http://www.dailyitem.com/archivesearch/local_story_163000144.html
  2. ^ http://www.wkok.com/roundtable/L&L11-20-07A.mp3 WKOK radio 1070, Leaders and Lawmakers interview December 20, 2007. mp3
  3. ^ Shikellamy school board adopts $34.6M budget, Daily Item, June 20, 2007 http://www.dailyitem.com/0100_news/local_story_171003120.html
  4. ^ Shikellamy budget approved Daily Item, May 19,2007 http://www.dailyitem.com/archivesearch/local_story_139001649.html
  5. ^ Tax reform proposal falls in all Valley school districts, Daily Item, May 19, 2007. http://www.dailyitem.com/archivesearch/local_story_139203055.html
  6. ^ Scott, Rob,"District to spend $55,000 on textbooks" The Daily Item, June 15, 2007.
  7. ^ http://www.dailyitem.com/0100_news/local_story_250000114.html Scott, Rob, "School District gets grant", The Daily Item, August 10, 2007.
  8. ^ Scott, Rob, "New Software enhances Core Subjects," The Daily Item, September 7, 2007.
  9. ^ Race, Michael, "Classrooms for the Future Schools", Pennsylvania Department of Education, August 30, 2007.

[edit] External links