Jul. 7—A New York City data analysis firm recently ranked Monongalia County's school district as the best in West Virginia.

Stacker lauded Mon Schools for graduations rates, student to teacher ratios and teacher salaries.

Mon's schools, the firm said, boasts a 91 % graduation rate with proficiency scores of 55 % and 50 % in reading and math, respectively.

The district also has a 15-to-1 teacher to student ratio and its educators average a little more than $51, 000 in take-home pay, according Stacker's data watchers.

Stacker made the announcement last week.

"We obviously appreciate hearing that in Mon County, " Deputy Schools Superintendent Donna Talerico said.

"That tells us we're doing the right thing, " she said.

The public districts of Putnam, Ohio, Doddridge and Tyler counties rounded out Stacker's top five districts, in that order.

Stacker, in part, drew from data already generated by Niche, a Pittsburgh-based market research firm that traditionally lists schools here at the top of its rankings.

Niche, in fact, just named Morgantown High and University High as the second-and third-best high schools in the Mountain State, coming in behind Bridgeport High in Harrison County, which received its No. 1 designation.

Last year, Niche declared North Elementary the best public elementary school in West Virginia, based on the above benchmarks. Suncrest Primary and Cheat Lake were also name No. 3 and No. 5, respectively.

It's not about numbers in a test packet, Talerico said. It's about lasting character lessons coming out of the classroom.

And lasting achievement, too, she said — many products of Mon schools have gone to earn degrees from Stanford, Harvard, Yale and other marquee schools, not to mention the Mountain State's flagship school of WVU in Morgantown.

"You can't deny our academic strengths, " she said, "plus, it's our job to mold our students into good citizens."

In the meantime, the Summer Avalanche learning enrichment camps are running all this month in every school across the district. Nearly 2, 000 are enrolled.

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