Panther Valley High School

Panther Valley High School is a small public high school providing grades 7 to 12. It is the only high school for the Panther Valley School District. Panther Valley High School is located in the borough of Summit Hill with a mailing address of 912 Coal Region Way, Lansford, PA 18232. It serves students in both Carbon County and Schuylkill County. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, in 2010, the school reported an enrollment of 488 pupils in grades 9th through 12th, with 219 pupils eligible for a federal free lunch. Panther Valley High School is a federal Title I school. The school employed 33 teachers yielding a student teacher ratio of 14:1. According to a report by the Pennsylvania Department of Education, 10 teachers were rated "Non‐Highly Qualified" under No Child Left Behind.
In July 2012, the Pennsylvania Department of Education released a report identifying 2 Panther Valley School District schools as among the lowest achieving schools for reading and mathematics in 2011. Both Panther Valley Middle School and Panther Valley High School are among the 15% lowest achieving schools in the Commonwealth. Parents and students 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. Fifty three public schools in Allegheny County are among the lowest achieving schools in 2011. According to the report, parents in 414 public schools were offered access to these scholarships. For the 2012-13 school year, eight 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, William Penn School District and Steelton-Highspire School District. Funding for the scholarships comes from donations by businesses which receive a state tax credit for donating.

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