Lehighton took home top honors as the best school district in Carbon County, according to a recent ranking released by Niche.

Niche is a website company that analyzes dozens of public data sets and millions of reviews to produce comprehensive rankings, report cards, and profiles for every K-12 school, college, and neighborhood in the country.

Factors used in the rankings include state test scores, parent and student surveys, college readiness, graduation rates, SAT/ACT scores, teacher quality, culture and diversity, health and safety, resources and facilities, clubs, activities, and sports offerings.

“This is a great accomplishment and our students and staff deserve the credit,” Lehighton Superintendent Jonathan Cleaver said.

Out of 497 school districts ranked in Pennsylvania, Lehighton ranked 50th for its teachers, 105th for its safety and 152nd for best places to teach.

Daniel Williams, high school teacher and Lehighton Area Education Association president, said the credit for any accolade such as this goes first to the students and their families.

“We have outstanding students, and this brings to light their effort and achievements at all levels,” Williams said. “In my opinion, our staff here at Lehighton is second to none. Our teachers, administrators, paraprofessionals, nurses, guidance counselors, secretaries and custodial staff come to work every day with one goal in mind; to provide the best educational opportunities for our students. We all take pride in our school district and it shows.”

Williams said Lehighton’s teachers want the district to be a place where families want to live.

“I think these rankings reflect that we are achieving that goal,” Williams said. “More than anything, I’m happy that this ranking provides an avenue for us to show our community all of the positive things that are happening in our school district.”

It also had the top ranked high school for Carbon County.

“I am very excited about the rankings,” said high school principal Sue Howland. “The Niche rankings provides other administrators and me a springboard for dialogue with our students, faculty and community members about progression in our district.”

Lehighton scored well in multiple categories such as best teachers, health and safety and clubs and activities, something Howland attributes to dedicated administrators and all staff throughout the district working together to meet the needs of our students.

“Everyone had been working to foster high student engagement, morale and a vibrant school setting,” she said. “We are constantly finding ways to increase rigor, provide opportunities to our students to better themselves and educate all to be valuable members of our community and society. The Lehighton Area School District has been expanding programs, opening up its facilities to the community and creating an inclusive feel for all of Lehighton.”

In terms of preparing students for college, Jim Thorpe Area High School leads the rankings for Carbon County, followed by Panther Valley, Lehighton, Carbon Career & Technical Institute, Palmerton and Weatherly.

Weatherly finished just behind Lehighton in overall district rankings for the county, followed by Jim Thorpe, Palmerton and Panther Valley.

In other information gathered from the rankings, Weatherly had the top-ranked elementary and middle school in the county.

Tamaqua was ranked seventh out of nine school districts in Schuylkill County, Pleasant Valley third out of four districts in Monroe County and Northern Lehigh eighth out of nine districts in Lehigh County.

A full list of rankings can be found at www.niche.com.