Sep 20, 2013 2 min read

The Trinity Area School Board Thursday approved several administrators’ pay raises, including a 3.8 percent increase to Superintendent Paul Kasunich that brings his 2013-14 salary to $149,313.

Assistant Superintendent Michael Lucas is set to earn $117,968, a 5 percent increase, and athletic director Bobby Jones received a 3 percent pay increase, raising his salary to $81,159.

District principals and the technology coordinator also earned salary increases.

The district’s pay raises are performance-based.

Also Thursday, the board received an update on the Collaborative Online Academy, the cyberschool the district partnered with Washington and Western Beaver school districts to start during the 2012-13 school year. Avella School District recently joined the COA, which the consortium hopes will enable it to offer more courses and build a bigger network.

Over the summer, 86 students enrolled in the COA for credit recovery classes, designed to help students make up missed courses or improve grades in order to graduate on time. The program has grown from 36 students to 108.

According to a report prepared by Trinity High School cyber coordinator Rebecca Macino, the COA saved Trinity about $234,000 in costs associated with students leaving the district for other cyber programs. The school district pays about $9,000 for each regular education student and $18,000 for learning support students to take classes through cyber charter schools across the state.

The COA offers after school tutoring that students are to attend once a week.

There are challenges, including the lack of a dedicated cyber lab and the difficulty of partnering with other districts that have different school calendars, pay structures, time requirements and curriculum, according to the report.