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Volunteer Clearances

Dear Northwestern Lehigh School District Volunteer,

Thank you for your interest in volunteering your time at Northwestern Lehigh School District. We know that your personal time is valuable and our students and staff greatly appreciate your commitment to volunteering in our school buildings and at student activities and events. In addition, as a volunteer, you will provide a great example and will be a role model to all our students and we hope that they will also become active volunteers in their community in the future.

  • A "direct contact volunteer" at Northwestern Lehigh School District is defined as “care, supervision, guidance or control of children AND routine interaction with children.”
  • Routine interaction is defined as "regular and repeated contact that is integral to a person's volunteer responsibilities." 

Examples of volunteer positions and activities that fit the definitions above and are required to have clearances include, but not limited to:

  • Chaperoning for multiple DAYTIME field trips
  • Chaperoning one or more OVERNIGHT field trips
  • Drama Club volunteers
  • Regular volunteer service/attendance at our schools to assist teachers in classrooms
  • Regular volunteer service/attendance at after-school club events to help supervise students (i.e: band camps, etc.) 

The MOST recent amendments to the Pennsylvania Child Protective Services law were effective August 25, 2015. Clearances are required for ALL volunteers and need to be renewed every 5 years or 60 months!

A volunteer as defined above and who has lived in Pennsylvania for the last 10 years or more will be required to provide two (2) clearances:

  1. PA State Police Criminal Clearance
  2. Child Abuse Clearance

NOTE: These two (2) clearances are FREE for volunteers. 

A volunteer that has NOT lived in Pennsylvania for the last 10 years must provide a third clearance:

      3. FBI Criminal Clearance

NOTE: This FBI clearance is $23.25 for volunteers.

You will find more information about the requirements and process for obtaining your volunteer clearances through the links below. In addition, volunteers must complete a "Volunteer Application" to be submitted with your clearances. 

The clearances and related documents must be submitted to the Northwestern Lehigh School District Human Resources office for review. Clearance documents may be scanned and emailed to HR@nwlehighsd.org. Or you mail or hand deliver the clearance documents to the Human Resources office.  The Human Resources office is located in the Administration Building. You will be notified by the Human Resources office staff when you are approved to volunteer at Northwestern Lehigh School District.

As the Director of Human Resources for the District, I also review and approve the required criminal history clearances for all our current and new employees. Please know that all clearance documents are handled and maintained in a confidential manner. 

Again, please accept my sincere “thank you” for volunteering at Northwestern Lehigh School District. Feel free to contact me at 610-298-8661 x 1233 if you have any questions and/or need any assistance to complete the criminal history record clearance process.

Respectfully yours,

Luann E. Matika, SPHR
Director of Human Resources

Links for Volunteer Clearances: