K-12 News

WLVR's Megan Frank talks with reporter Sarah Mueller and LehighValleyNews.com executive editor Jim Deegan.

The financially flush campaigns are a stark contrast from traditional school board races, where candidates rarely spent more than $250 while campaigning for the unpaid offices.

Parental rights are on the agenda in school races as moms versus moms battle for control to set policies on book restrictions, bathrooms, transgender students and teaching history.

Candidates have different takes on whether taxes should raised to support capital improvements, expanding kindergarten classes and teacher retention.

Take a look at stories that ran throughout the week of which we are most proud, had a profound impact on readers or that you might want to look at again.

The decision comes after several members of community group Promise Neighborhoods, an anti-violence nonprofit, accused Phoebe Harris of unprofessional behavior.

Nazareth school board members said they want to review the current regulations for reviewing books, concerned it's a slippery slope. Reviewing all books submitted to the district could cost more than $100,000.

Kids from five schools got live demonstrations of cow milking, beekeeping, apple farming and more. Organizers say it's meant to spark interest and explain an industry that they say sometimes goes unappreciated.

The East Penn School Board held a presentation over proposed facilities expansions due to anticipated enrollment increases. Options included shifting grades 5/6 and 7/8 into their own buildings, and constructing a new high school.

Take a look at stories that ran throughout the week of which we are most proud, had a profound impact on readers or that you might want to look at again.

Nearly 87 percent of cases in the middle and high schools are in students who haven't been vaccinated.

The ruling comes as COVID-19 case counts and hospitalizations rise dramatically in Pennsylvania.

BASD Superintendent Joseph Roy is concerned that growing cases throughout the community are causing the number of school cases to grow.

Arguments before the Pa. Supreme Court will begin Dec. 8 but it is unknown when the decision will come down.

An appeal by the Wolf administration put a court order to end the mandate on hold.

Concerns over students’ mental health made headlines last year.

Just like businesses, school cafeterias are being hit by supply chain and labor shortage issues. Meaning in this pandemic, even the school lunch menu is TBD.

This fall, the pandemic’s kindergarteners entered first grade. For some students, this marked a milestone: their first time attending school in person.

The past year and a half has been traumatic for many people, including children. Many are starting the school year once again under the cloud of COVID-19. A Lehigh Valley yoga instructor is sharing ways to help kids de-stress.

The Bethlehem Area School District’s Miller Heights Elementary is operating remotely after a dozen COVID-19 cases affected students in five of its classrooms.

Tuesday was the start for Pennsylvania’s K through 12 masking mandate. The order was issued last week by Acting Secretary of Health Alison Beam, not Gov. Wolf. Sarah Anne Hughes, deputy editor for SpotlightPA, a nonpartisan investigative newsroom which has been covering these issues, recently joined us by phone to discuss the move by the Wolf administration.

Pennsylvania’s Republican-controlled House of Representatives is mulling a legislative challenge to the Wolf administration’s latest mask mandate for schools. A group of state senators, meanwhile, is readying a bill to change the state’s constitution to prevent those mandates.