Early Intervention Preschool / Elementary Schools
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The Opportunity Scholarship Tax Credit Program (OSTCP) at Penn-Lincoln Elementary
The Opportunity Scholarship Tax Credit Program (OSTCP) was created pursuant to Act 85 of 2012 (72 P.S. § 1701-G.1, et seq) and amended by Act 86 of 2016 (24 P.S. § 2001-B, et seq). This program enables eligible students residing within the boundaries of low-achieving schools to apply for a scholarship to attend another school district or nonpublic school. A low achieving school is defined as a public elementary or secondary school ranking in the bottom 15% of their designation as elementary of secondary school based on the combined math and reading scores on the previous school year PSSA.
Penn Lincoln is on the list of the bottom 15% for performance on the combined Math and Reading tests on the 2021-2022 PSSA exams. Pursuant to Section 2010-B of the School Code, 24 P.S. §20-2010-B, the Pennsylvania Department of Education (“PDE”) is required to publish a list of “low achieving schools”. PDE is also required to provide notice to school districts with low achieving schools. Under the authority of Act 13 of 2020, the required assessments that determine whether a school is low achieving were cancelled due to COVID-19. Despite the cancellation of the 2020 assessments, PDE must comply with publication and notification requirements for low achieving schools by Feb. 1, 2021. As a result, the list of low achieving schools for 2021 is based on the 2019 assessments; the most recent year that assessment data is available.
Under the OSTCP program, Penn Lincoln must offer students the choice to transfer to another school district or nonpublic school. Please know that the staff at Penn Lincoln has a relationship with your child and wants to continue serving your child. However, if you feel your child will be better served in another school, you may request a transfer for your child to one of the schools participating in the OSTCP.
If you wish to take advantage of this opportunity for your child to attend another school, you must go to the
Department of Community and Economic Development (DCED) website:
www.dced.pa.gov/programs/opportunity-scholarship-tax-credit-program-ostc/.
