Shikellamy School District - Academic Achievement

Academic Achievement

In 2013, Shikellamy School District was ranked 334th out of 498 Pennsylvania school districts by the Pittsburgh Business Times. The ranking was based on student academic performance on the past 3 years of PSSA results in: reading, writing, mathematics and science.

• 2012 - 371st
• 2011 - 334th
• 2010 - 383rd
• 2009 - 380th
• 2008 - 425th
• 2007 - 434th out of 501 school districts.

The Pittsburgh Business Times also reported an Overachievers Ranking for 498 Pennsylvania school districts. Shikellamy ranked 352nd in 2010. In 2009, the district was 397th. The paper describes the ranking as: "a ranking answers the question - which school districts do better than expectations based upon economics? This rank takes the Honor Roll rank and adds the percentage of students in the district eligible for free and reduced lunch into the formula. A district finishing high on this rank is smashing expectations, and any district above the median point is exceeding expectations."

In July 2012, the Pennsylvania Department of Education released a report identifying two Shikellamy School District schools as among the lowest achieving schools for reading and mathematics in 2011. Grace S. Beck School and Chief Shikellamy School are on the 15% lowest achieving schools in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Parents may be eligible for scholarships to transfer to another public or nonpublic school through the state's Opportunity Scholarship Tax Credit Program passed in June 2012. The scholarships are limited to those students whose family's income is less than $60,000 annually, with another $12,000 allowed per dependent. Maximum scholarship award is $8,500, with special education students receiving up to $15,000 for a year's tuition. Parents pay any difference between the scholarship amount and the receiving school's tuition rate. Students may seek admission to neighboring public school districts. Each year the PDE publishes the tuition rate for each individual public school district. The 2 Shikellamy schools are the only ones in Northumberland County on the list. According to the state report, parents in 414 public schools (74 school districts) were offered access to these scholarships. For the 2012-13 school year, seven public school districts in Pennsylvania had all of their schools placed on the list including: Sto-Rox School District, Chester Upland School District, Clairton City School District, Duquesne City School District, Farrell Area School District, Wilkinsburg Borough School District and Steelton-Highspire School District. Funding for the scholarships comes from donations by businesses which receive a state tax credit for donating.

In 2011 and 2010, Shikellamy School District achieved Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) status. In 2011, 94 percent of the 500 Pennsylvania public school districts achieved the No Child Left Behind Act progress level of 72% of students reading on grade level and 67% of students demonstrating on grade level math. In 2011, 46.9 percent of Pennsylvania school districts achieved Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) based on student performance. An additional 37.8 percent of school districts made AYP based on a calculated method called safe harbor, 8.2 percent on the growth model and 0.8 percent on a two-year average performance. School districts can achieve AYP even though their individual schools do not. For example: Shikellamy High School is in Corrective Action II in 2011.

Shikellamy student proficiency in reading, math and science has trailed other students both in the region and in the state. The district was in the bottom 17th percentile in the state, for academic achievement in 2009.