PA's First All "Green" High School is Complete Speaking to a crowd of several hundred in the soaring, glass-enclosed student commons of the new Wellsboro High School, Vern McKissick commented on the challenge of creating a school that conforms to the demanding LEED requirements. "It is a tribute to the vision of the Wellsboro School Board when you see the final product. The school uses ground-source heat pumps, sustainably harvested wood siding and roof decking over a steel superstructure sourced from Pennsylvania. High recycled content products are used throughout, and low- or no-VOC (Volatile Organic Compounds)," said the architect and graduate of Wellsboro High School. The dedication ceremony included addresses by McKissick, project architect Carl Kanaskie and United States Congressman John Peterson. McKissick and Kanaskie previously collaborated on another Wellsboro project, the Charlotte Lappla Early Childhood Center that was selected in 2003 by American School and University magazine as the top educational renovation and addition in the United States. In his address, McKissick credited his wife, and business partner, Kristen with the interior design of the school. "This whole project has allowed me to return 'home' &endash; in a manner of speaking," said McKissick. "I attended first grade at the Charlotte Lappla building and graduated from high school in the old building. Being able to renovate the one, and to oversee the design of the successor of the other has been a dream come true." Scranton McKissick Associates has been retained by the Scranton School District to provide master planning and demographic analysis in the Lackawanna County school district. According to Vern McKissick, "The project will involve preparation of an updated conditions and curriculum assessment of over two million square feet of space, housing the Scranton School District's 15,000 pupils in grades K-12. The study effort will particularly emphasize reconfiguration, replacement or realignment of the District's 13 elementary schools. Our firm will utilize its proven Geographic Information System (GIS) technologies to analyze current and future growth patterns in the City of Scranton as they affect attendance areas for each school. McKissick Associates' efforts are intended to re-shape the direction of the district's proposed $60 million building program." Elizabethtown The Elizabethtown School District has hired McKissick Associates to conduct a feasibility study for the district. The firm will conduct a comprehensive study of the district's present level of school-age population density and to provide projections for future school district building needs and requirements. The study will map student residential locations, including school bus routes, to determine student ratios for the district. According to Vern McKissick, "We will be utilizing Geographic Information Systems (GIS) technology to map the entire district. GIS will allow us to link location to information, such as people to addresses, buildings to parcels, or streets within a network. It is, quite simply, the latest technology for conducting a study of this type."