115 Caldwell Ct
Colmar, PA 18915

This school used to be stellar. In the past four years, leadership has become very removed from involving parents and developing a rapport with students. An overabundance of meaningless Spirit Days mean children no longer want to participate in them. There’s a verbal focus on bullying but no real follow through. The positive areas are extremely caring teachers, excellent specials instruction and the real connections made in classes. The music department is outstanding and the schools orchestra is the best. The office staff works very hard despite the hardships they must endure due to ineffective leadership.

My oldest son currently goes to Penndale and I am dreading sending my youngest in a few years. The building's nickname is "Pennjail". There is no air conditioning. There are run down facilities and barbed wire fencing.Athletics are decent but terrible communication (won't post schedules). The academics are rough. They operate with a 90%-10% in many classes and the teachers do not communicate the grades. They do not hold conferences.Attending sporting events is awful as the students are allowed free run of the events. Special education is abysmal. My son was denied to even be tested for an IEP. I am a teacher so I knew how to advocate but the casual parents will not be as lucky.It is very clear in the district that the focus is the high school and the middle grades get overlooked.

This school has many positive attributes including a very robust selection of courses, a variety of leveled classes to meet student needs, great teachers, staff and admin that are interested and engaged in the students. Numerous STEAM clubs and extracurricular groups as well as huge variety of sports. It is also very inclusive of the diversity in its student body. Where NP is lacking however is in Special Education, fulfillment and creation of realistic and supportive IEPs. If your kid has learning differences, it is important to educate yourself on PA law around IDEA and FAPE as well as the IEP process. It is also very lacking in an effective management of bullying and implementing top-down positive social emotional programming programming. I cannot completely fault the district on this however as many of the parents are also bullies and teach it to their kids. What I would like to see implemented is a stronger anti-bullying policy with consequences that impact not just the students but inconvenience the parents just enough for them to motivate their child to stop with bullying. Overall a great school which prepares students for whatever path they choose after college with 2 significant caveats that the school district really needs to prioritize.