Fox Chapel Area School District officials and staff prepare for 2025-26 school year

Fox Chapel Area School District officials and staff are eager to welcome students for the 2025-26 school year.

The first day of school is Aug. 21.

Officials said there are about 355 teachers ready to educate about 4,330 students, an increase of 52 students from last school year’s 4,278 enrollment.

“(We are) so excited to welcome students to the upcoming school year,” Superintendent Mary Catherine Reljac said. “The anticipation is building each week as we get closer to the first day with students. Our school district has been busy over the summer, making sure that we are preparing for this upcoming school year.

“We are preparing our facilities, preparing our curriculum, preparing our programming and the missing ingredient is to have our students here to be able to be part of that school community.”

Reljac said the enrollment boost is spread out over all grade levels. She noted enrollment may change closer to the start of school.

The district did add some elementary classrooms to accommodate class sizes, including kindergarten at Fairview Elementary, a second grade classroom at Hartwood Elementary, a third grade classroom at O’Hara Elementary and a fourth grade classroom at O’Hara Elementary.

“The district was well positioned to be able to accommodate those new students without any real meaningful impact outside of some new classrooms at our elementary level, based on where we had a few little bumps in enrollment,” Reljac said. “We are thrilled to have a growing student enrollment here in the district.”

The district welcomes not only new students, but various new staffers this coming school year.

Reljac said there will be some new faces at nearly all the schools. They include teachers, support staff, custodians, instructional assistants and secretaries.

“We are excited about all of those people that are joining our district,” the superintendent said. “Sometimes people only think of the staff in the school district in narrow terms. We have many, many staff members across the district that all play a role in supporting our students.”

School meals

Student lunch prices remain the same from last school year. Elementary lunches are $2.65 and secondary student lunches are $2.95. Milk is once again 75 cents.

All school meals will be free for students at Hartwood and Kerr Elementary schools. All students eligible for reduced-price lunches will receive free lunch through the state government.

Educational adjustments

The district is continuing to implement the social studies curriculum myWorld by Savaas for students in kindergarten through grade 5. It brings learning to life through storytelling, literacy instruction and an emphasis on collaboration and communication, all with the goal of developing thoughtful, literate citizens. This will be the second year for that curriculum’s use.

“It was a successful first year, and after every first year of curriculum implementation, there are some adjustments made and some shifts made based on student feedback and educator feedback,” Reljac said. “We’re going to deepen our work with myWorld.”

Fox Chapel Area also continues its transition the state’s new K-12 standards in STEELS — Science, Technology & Engineering and Environmental Literacy & Sustainability.

The district will be one of the first in the nation to implement OpenSciEducation in kindergarten through grade 5.

“The shift is really to a phenomenon-based science instruction where students help create the questions about the scientific phenomenon,” Reljac said. “They study it. They help to create the experiments they will do and then they reflect on that. This has been a multi-year professional learning approach for our staff. There was a pilot last year with classrooms in all of our elementary schools. That pilot was successful. We are pleased to adopt those materials.”

Reljac said it is an evolution of science learning and enhances the student engagement with scientific concepts and the learning process.

More advanced literature courses are being offered at Dorseyville Middle School. A Spanish literature and culture class was added to the middle school last year. The Spanish immersion class at Kerr Elementary remains on pause.

Building upgrades

Hartwood Elementary School went through a major building upgrade over the summer with a new HVAC system with high-efficiency boilers, as well as the installation of new LED lighting. It replaces a 30-year-old heating and cooling system.

Other upgrades include a new main water line at the high school and new environmentally friendly stadium lighting.

There were also some carpeting, painting and landscaping projects district-wide.

“Our custodial and maintenance staff have worked really hard over the summer to make sure that our facilities are ready for the use that they get during the school year,” Reljac said. “You can see the shine in our hallways and our classrooms as we are preparing for it.”

New website look

Fox Chapel Area High School athletics revamped its website to make it more streamlined and easier for families.

The site, fcasdathletics.org, features a detailed calendar on the left of the main page.

It lists dates, times and locations of events such as golf, tennis and cross country activities. There is a section for livestreamed football games on the front page.

In the “About” tab, there is a list of booster organizations and the names of their main contacts.

The “Student-Athletes” tab has information on registrations, scholarships as well as strength and conditioning and transportation.

“The revamped athletics website is a continued upgrade and enhancement of our already robust site, with some updated features that provide a more user-friendly experience,” said Mike O’Brien, district director of athletics.

In-year planning

The district will be engaging in its comprehensive planning process throughout the year.

Reljac said there will be opportunities for families to provide input and help co-create the plan.

Additionally, Fox Chapel Area will be looking for new experiences for staff and students to learn more about artificial intelligence.