Northwestern Lehigh School Board Director Joe Reiter announced Sandra Himes is resigning as director of Lehigh Career and Technical Institute.

Fellow school board members expressed surprised during the July 15 meeting as Himes has only been with LCTI three years.

Four members of the school board were absent. President Paul Fisher said the reason was "vacations."

Fisher said there is still no state budget but there will be one, hopefully soon.

Superintendent Dr. Mary Anne Wright received a letter from the Secretary of Education

Since a more rigorous set of standards has been used, PSSA test scores have been lower. She explained a higher bar is expected to better prepare students to be college or career ready.

Pennsylvania's Department of Education is ready to help districts improve student achievement and spread the word throughout the community.

Wright said a standardized test only measures achievement for a snapshot in time. She said 70.1 percent of math scores were basic or below basic.

In other business, there were two bids for the sewer plant work at Weisenberg Elementary. The low bid was $20,800 from Bellview Pump.

The Flo Gard bid was awarded to Old Castle Stormwater Solution to close the NPDES permit with work on a catch basin at Weisenberg at $10,740 pending legal review.

Money in the amount of $2,850,000 has been transferred from the capital fund to the capital reserve to pay the McClure contract, for an energy savings survey.

Sports ticket prices for 2016 remain the same as last year, with $5 for the fall drama presentation, $8 for the spring musical and $5 for the middle school theater. Student and senior citizen prices are discounted and district resident senior citizens may obtain a pass from the superintendent's office. Season passes are available.

A special education agreement was approved with the Carbon Lehigh Intermediate Unit 21.

An agreement for professional development for the middle school, also with CLIU 21 in the amount of $2,400 of Title II funds was also approved.

The driver's ed program at the CLIU agreement specifies no cost to the district. The student pays $118 for an online course and $290 for behind-the-wheel work.

Meadow Psychiatric Center, Centre Hall, will be used as needed.

Special education agreements with Whitehall-Coplay and New Story Schools of Wyomissing were approved.

Five professional development workshops were approved from Penn State for $8,400 for the elementary schools. This is from Title II funds.

An agreement was authorized with Lehigh Valley Hospital for a supplemental part-time athletic trainer for the next three years at a cost of $8,000 per year.

The cyber-charter schools had the highest paid tuition last year for a total of $800,000.

Circle of Seasons, the local charter school, had about 30 Northwestern students. Some of the cyber schools use the same online work as Northwestern uses for its cyber school classes.

"Parents do what they think is best for the child," Reiter said. "It is not a reflection on public schools."