Palisades High School ranks in top 6% in Pennsylvania

Palisades High School has been ranked in the top 6% in Pennsylvania and the top 14% nationally by U.S. News & World Report.
The accomplishment was announced at the May 4 public school board meeting, during the student representatives’ report given by seniors Brooke Balsamo and Sammie Trickel, and junior Camilla O’Donnell.
The school was ranked #91 out of 1,477 public, charter, and magnet high schools in the state, and #2,573 out of 17,843 nationally. Its score card grade was based on a 94% graduation rate; proficiency percentiles of 80 in mathematics, 81 in reading, and 84 in science; and taking and passing Advanced Placement exam percentiles of 42 and 30.
Ranking factors also included college readiness and curriculum breadth indices, and state proficiency and performance assessments. Further information is available at usnews.com/education/best-high-schools.
Also at the May 4 school board meeting, directors approved a five-year contract renewal for its bus transportation vendor, George Krapf Jr. & Sons Inc. of West Chester, which had replaced a long-running prior vendor in 2016.
At the insistence of a director, the board had delayed approval at its April 6 meeting because of the addition of a clause added by the vendor, after an agreement had already been struck, that would have required the district to pay 90% of the costs for any bus run that is canceled for more than 10 days.

After the district had directed the vendor to remove that clause, through its Fiscal Committee meeting on April 20, the board approved the renewal on May 4.
The contractor was said to believe that most school districts wanted that 90% language to be able to continue to pay their drivers during any long periods when bus runs would not be operational, so they would not find another job and be unavailable when suspended runs resumed. A critical bus driver shortage in Palisades had been noted earlier in the school year.
The rural district, which covers over 100 square miles, has been noted as presenting special difficulties for bus transportation.