School closings, classroom changes looming in Pittsburgh Public Schools

PITTSBURGH — City schools Superintendent Linda Lane recommended closing, consolidating or reconfiguring five to 10 schools as part of her plan to close the district's financial gap.

“We're sensitive to the communities that have borne the brunt of school closures,” she said on Tuesday during a preview of her state of the district address before the school board. Lane will make a full report Wednesday morning at Pittsburgh CAPA.

She suggested last month closing Woolslair Elementary School in Bloomfield.

This article was written by Channel 11's news exchange partners at TribLIVE.

Lane said she is focusing on “underenrolled” rather than just small schools. She said the district will examine other factors, such as the availability of nearby schools to accept the students from the school being closed.

She and her staff have been trying to develop ways by which Pittsburgh Public Schools can lower a budget deficit of $18.3 million in the proposed budget of $529.2 million for next year.

Besides closing schools, Lane offered these options:

• Requiring one high school teacher in each department to teach an extra class;

• Reducing the number of periods in the high schools from nine to eight;

• Expanding the use of Port Authority to transport students;

• Saving transportation costs by providing more services in the home schools rather than regional schools such as Pittsburgh Conroy;

• Offering fewer sports.

“Some of these things you could send out to the public could be alarming,” said board member Mark Brentley Sr., referring to the announcement of further possible school closings.

Carey Harris, a mother of three children in the district, likes the education they are getting. But, she said, she recognizes the district's financial challenges and the need to get four new school board members, who were sworn in Monday, up to speed on the workings of the district. Harris is executive director of A+ Schools, a watchdog group of the district.

“With Dr. Lane's cool, calm, steady hand, I'm optimistic,” she said.

But Pamela Harbin, a Point Breeze mother, does not like the direction that the district is going, She is a member of Great Public Schools Pittsburgh, another watchdog group of the district.

“I'd like to see a plan that ensures a positive school climate where teachers can teach and students can learn,” she said. “They really need to look at the needs of each school, and I don't think they've ever really done that.”

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