What if Pittsburgh Annexed All Adjacent Suburbs? (Liberty, Highland Park: home, neighborhood)

[tyovan4]

Originally Posted by szug-bot

no mayor will have the guts to challenge them , their shoddy management, and requests for higher taxes, even knowing that enrollment has declined so much!

Well, my favorite Mayor has..

Despite criticism, Mr. Peduto continued to dig in his heels, criticizing the nearly $137 million increase in spending by the district since he took office in 2014, even though enrollment has dropped by 1,169 since that year.

On Tuesday, he sat in his office with a paper of calculations, comparing Pittsburgh Public Schools’ spending year over year.

“It’s not just this [tax] issue, it’s every time I mention the word school, they immediately say ‘stay in your lane. You have nothing to do with this.’ One of the biggest reasons I can’t get families to move into [the city] is because of Pittsburgh Public Schools,” he said. “... I have everything to do with Pittsburgh Public Schools because the very future of Pittsburgh depends on it.”

Mr. Peduto cited recent figures from the A+ Schools advocacy group report that 51% of PPS students meet the third-grade reading proficiency level, 37% meet the high school math readiness level, and the district had a graduation rate of 79% in 2018.

“How is it that they’re spending so much money and yet have to raise taxes and the results are worse? Why isn’t anybody on the school board asking these questions? ... What is it that’s keeping them from accountability?” Mr. Peduto said.

https://www.post-gazette.com/news/ed...s/201911210176

Its interesting that Peduto, the Great Progressive himself, will basically come out and admit that PPS sucks - which is a bridge too far for some of our City-dwelling urbanists.

That being said, regarding Peduto's criticisms of PPS - I think that he's doing the right thing, but for the wrong reasons.

[erieguy]

He’s certainly not wrong in that the school system certainly isn’t desirable, which is certainly a problem in attracting people.

[eschaton]

Originally Posted by szug-bot

the PPS - a dwindling population? thanks for the stat. no mayor will have the guts to challenge them , their shoddy management, and requests for higher taxes, even knowing that enrollment has declined so much!

Years back I had read an interesting hypothesis that Chris Briem - who used to write on the local Pittsburgh blog Null Space - had. He noted that the steep decline in PPS enrollment followed a period in the 1980s and 1990s where despite hemorrhaging population PPS enrollment barely changed at all. He didn't have any evidence to prove this, but he suspected that the district had in an earlier period engaged in fraud (in order to keep state reimbursement levels high), a new regime came in which was more honest, but rather than come clean entirely they squared away the old fudged numbers by recording all of the decline over that 15-20 year period within a short period of time.

[szug-bot]

Originally Posted by tyovan4

Well, my favorite Mayor has..



Its interesting that Peduto, the Great Progressive himself, will basically come out and admit that PPS sucks - which is a bridge too far for some of our City-dwelling urbanists.

That being said, regarding Peduto's criticisms of PPS - I think that he's doing the right thing, but for the wrong reasons.

??? please explain why for "the wrong reasons".

[SteelCityRising]

I have relatively affluent neighbors across the street from me. I moved to Polish Hill in 2010. They moved here in 2013. They are both 40ish educated professionals. They have two beautiful young daughters. They currently send their eldest daughter to PPS Fulton for Pre-Kindergarten (I'm guessing through the magnet program), and they've been very happy. Back when they first moved here and had their first child I was starting to take mental bets on whether or not I'd see a "FOR SALE" sign go up on their domicile once the eldest child reached school age. After speaking to them recently they have no plans to move, love the city, love the neighborhood, and are going to continue to utilize PPS.

I think as long as enough middle-class parents continue pushing their kids into PPS, then positive change can and will occur organically over time. I know we have a few on here who utilize PPS (Eschaton, for starters, and I'm pretty sure either xdv8, gladhands, and/or wpipkins2, too). I think former member Lobick also utilized PPS. More and more middle-class parents need to start selecting PPS instead of going to the private/parochial/charter route. The reason why PPS has such poor standardized test scores is because PPS disproportionately educates more lower-income students than the city at-large. Generally speaking if you look at standardized test score rankings the highest districts are always affluent lily-white-majority ones (i.e. Fox Chapel Area, North Allegheny, Upper St. Clair, etc.) whereas the worst-ranking districts are always the poor black-majority ones (i.e. PPS, Wilkinsburg, McKeesport, etc.)

This doesn't mean "PPS teachers bad; Fox Chapel Area teachers good". What this means is that a higher percentage of the student body at Fox Chapel Area is derived from a background where parents place a greater emphasis upon education. Ergo, Fox Chapel Area teachers have to do less "parenting" than PPS teachers. Switch the demographics around a bit to where there's more of a plurality between disadvantaged and NOT disadvantaged at PPS? Scores will improve.

[Paul2421]

Originally Posted by SteelCityRising

I have relatively affluent neighbors across the street from me. I moved to Polish Hill in 2010. They moved here in 2013. They are both 40ish educated professionals. They have two beautiful young daughters. They currently send their eldest daughter to PPS Fulton for Pre-Kindergarten (I'm guessing through the magnet program), and they've been very happy. Back when they first moved here and had their first child I was starting to take mental bets on whether or not I'd see a "FOR SALE" sign go up on their domicile once the eldest child reached school age. After speaking to them recently they have no plans to move, love the city, love the neighborhood, and are going to continue to utilize PPS.

I think as long as enough middle-class parents continue pushing their kids into PPS, then positive change can and will occur organically over time. I know we have a few on here who utilize PPS (Eschaton, for starters, and I'm pretty sure either xdv8, gladhands, and/or wpipkins2, too). I think former member Lobick also utilized PPS. More and more middle-class parents need to start selecting PPS instead of going to the private/parochial/charter route. The reason why PPS has such poor standardized test scores is because PPS disproportionately educates more lower-income students than the city at-large. Generally speaking if you look at standardized test score rankings the highest districts are always affluent lily-white-majority ones (i.e. Fox Chapel Area, North Allegheny, Upper St. Clair, etc.) whereas the worst-ranking districts are always the poor black-majority ones (i.e. PPS, Wilkinsburg, McKeesport, etc.)

This doesn't mean "PPS teachers bad; Fox Chapel Area teachers good". What this means is that a higher percentage of the student body at Fox Chapel Area is derived from a background where parents place a greater emphasis upon education. Ergo, Fox Chapel Area teachers have to do less "parenting" than PPS teachers. Switch the demographics around a bit to where there's more of a plurality between disadvantaged and NOT disadvantaged at PPS? Scores will improve.

you certainly have some good points here. but the couple across the street is upper middle class to upper class...and goes to a magnet...which hurts pps in general. not much different from the despised private/charter schools.

and just some food for thought, but NA is 20% non-white at this point. it is pretty apparent that minorities are seeking out the district due to the growing enrollment.

[eschaton]

Originally Posted by Paul2421

you certainly have some good points here. but the couple across the street is upper middle class to upper class...and goes to a magnet...which hurts pps in general. not much different from the despised private/charter schools.

Magnet schools, unlike charters, are part of PPS and have been in the district for generations. They were originally created as a voluntary method of integrating the public school system. The PPS Board of Education is in charge of them, and PPS teachers educate the children.

Now, you can argue they hurt the neighborhood schools, but that's not the same thing as public schools. There are some cities - like Boston and San Francisco - that essentially don't have neighborhood schools at all.

[tyovan4]

Originally Posted by szug-bot

??? please explain why for "the wrong reasons".

Well, the schools have been a mess for a long time.
Hamlet has been under fire since before he was hired.
Scores have been low and price-per-student has been high for a long time.

But Bicycle Bill only began to speak up once PPS mentioned taking back the portion of its tax revenues that were diverted to the City when the City entered Act 47. Now that the City is out of Act 47 and Peduto touts what great fiscal shape the City is in, PPS asks for their money back. And Billy Boy hits the roof.

Peduto is speaking up because PPS wants to take money out of his coffers, and I also believe he's trying to increase his office's power over public education.

[Paul2421]

Originally Posted by eschaton

Magnet schools, unlike charters, are part of PPS and have been in the district for generations. They were originally created as a voluntary method of integrating the public school system. The PPS Board of Education is in charge of them, and PPS teachers educate the children.

Now, you can argue they hurt the neighborhood schools, but that's not the same thing as public schools. There are some cities - like Boston and San Francisco - that essentially don't have neighborhood schools at all.

i understand. one way to improve pps would be to eliminate the magnet schools. they are islands of educational prosperity and resources. obviously it is more complicated than that though.

[szug-bot]

Originally Posted by SteelCityRising

... Switch the demographics around a bit to where there's more of a plurality between disadvantaged and NOT disadvantaged at PPS? Scores will improve.

back to square 1 - HOW to do this when the school system overall is not as attractive as what can be found in the suburbs?

obviously, some people here are experts on public schooling than I (having no kids). what is someone suggested that public schooling should be phased out, anyway? all learning done from home, or from magnet schools such as the STEM in Oakland? thoughts on this?