Students celebrate Chartiers Valley Primary School’s birthday

Students helped the celebration by making a card, putting their fingerprints on a flag and listening to stories from retired teacher Mary Coperich.

Each student at the primary school, which serves approximately 800 students in kindergarten through second grade, received a cupcake eraser thanks to the Social-Emotional Learning Committee.

In 1996, the primary school formed when six Chartiers Valley elementary schools closed: S.S. Nixon and Foxcroft and Henry Roberts in Scott; E.L. Shepard in Collier; Washington in Bridgeville; and Heidelberg in the borough of the same name.

Located at 1000 Lindsay Road, Nixon was named after the owner of the land on which the school eventually was built, Samuel S. Nixon (1811-1892). After the school’s closing, the building was used for a church.

Foxcroft was at 808 Hope St., off Swallow Hill Road and near what today serves as Chartiers Valley Intermediate School and the district’s administrative offices. Henry Roberts, 50 Vanadium Road, now is Vanadium Woods Village, a UPMC retirement community.

E.L. Shepard was situated near Settlers Cabin Park. After it closed in 1986, students from Rennerdale Elementary school were transferred to Shepard, which was named after World War I veteran Edwin LeRoy Shepard, who was supervising principal of Collier schools from 1941-54.

The former Washington Elementary, 528 Dewey Ave., is another site for a senior living community, Halcyon of Bridgeville.

Built in the late 1950s, Heidelberg Elementary was located at 1819 Ellsworth Ave. The building was used for commercial purposes until it was bought for $550,000 by Three Hierarchs Eastern Orthodox School, which occupied the building from 2007-13. Later, it became a children’s center.