Lake County Gazette

Mrs. Mullen’s class at Coal City Community Unit School District 1 is focusing on building foundational skills as part of their school routine. The students, with guidance from Mrs. Mullen, are learning about letters, numbers, and counting. Recently, the class spent time exploring the letter E by using stickers to form the letter and searching for items that begin with E. They have also been practicing alphabet recognition by finding items hidden in acorns.

The school district includes several schools such as Coal City Early Childhood Center, Coal City Elementary School, Coal City High School, Coal City Intermediate School, and Coal City Middle School in Grundy and Will counties. More information about the district can be found at https://www.illinoisreportcard.com/.

According to the Illinois State Board of Education, there are 153 teachers in the district earning an average salary of $69,297 before pension contributions. Of these teachers, 77.9 percent are women and 22.1 percent are men; none have more than ten absences in a school year (https://www.illinoisreportcard.com/).

Demographic data from ISBE shows that the student population is 86.9 percent White, 0.6 percent Black, 9.6 percent Hispanic, and 0.6 percent Asian (https://www.illinoisreportcard.com/).

In terms of spending, the district allocated $21,619 per student in 2020 for a total expenditure of $47 million (https://www.illinoisreportcard.com/).

"Mrs. Mullen’s friends have also been talking about the letters of the alphabet by finding items hidden in acorns," according to information shared by Mrs. Mullen's class.

"The students are working hard on following the school routine and learning new things," said Mrs. Mullen.