The top reported proficiency rate is 91% in Science. The lowest is 42% in English language arts.
Original Research by School Decision on Hasson Heights Sch
Hasson Heights School serves kindergarten through fourth grade in Oil City, a small former industrial city in the Allegheny foothills where the local economy has shifted from oil refining to healthcare, manufacturing, and regional education. The school sits in a residential neighborhood near Hasson Park, away from the downtown business district, and enrolls a small cohort of students drawn from the surrounding hillside neighborhoods of modest wood-frame homes.
The school's profile reflects a mixed academic picture. Science performance is strong, with proficiency well above the midpoint. Reading and mathematics proficiency, however, are both below the middle of the range for Venango County schools, suggesting that early literacy and numeracy are areas where the school is working with more challenge than strength. Data on special education enrollment, English learner counts, and other support-population details were not available, so a parent may want to ask the school directly about how it differentiates instruction and what supports are in place for students who fall behind in core subjects.
A substantial share of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, reflecting the economic composition of the school's catchment area. The student body is predominantly white, with smaller shares of Hispanic, biracial, Black, and Native American students. The school serves no specialized populations, magnet programs, or alternative tracks; it is a straightforward neighborhood elementary school.
The district itself is experiencing steady pressure. The Oil City Area School District held its property tax rate flat for the 2025-26 school year even as overall spending rose, a sign that the district absorbed cost increases without asking homeowners for more revenue. At the same time, the board is revisiting the decision to remove librarians from elementary schools, with a proposal to reintegrate library programming back into schools like Hasson Heights. That discussion signals that some families and educators are flagging the loss of dedicated library and research instruction as a gap.
Housing in Oil City is affordable relative to state and national benchmarks, with a median home value well below the Pennsylvania and US averages and monthly mortgage costs low enough to make purchase accessible to many families. The city itself is experiencing incremental reinvestment rather than rapid growth: historic downtown buildings are being rehabilitated, artists have relocated and opened studios, and small local businesses have taken root in the once-empty storefronts. The overall tone is steady, careful recovery from decades of population loss rather than expansion. A parent moving to Oil City should expect a neighborhood-oriented, affordable community with modest school resources and a transparent effort to do more with less.
See more original research from School Decision →