To Diamond McGowan, a senior at Brashear High School in Pittsburgh’s Beechview neighborhood, her school district can never take in too much feedback from students.
“Because it's all about us, so there's never enough of us speaking,” McGowan said. “Though they have been doing a lot better with asking our opinions.”
It’s something Pittsburgh Public Schools superintendent Wayne Walters has repeatedly emphasized throughout the process to reshape the district’s footprint: members of his Student Advisory Council canvassed schools to find out how the slate of proposed changes — namely school closures, grade reconfigurations and program adjustments — sit with students.
But in the school board’s monthly public hearings and town halls hosted by the consultants who drew up school closure recommendations last year, Pittsburgh parents and teachers have been the loudest voices in the room.
“And I'm more frustrated that the voices of my students aren't elevated in those ways when they are our core customers,” Walters told WESA in October. “They have voice, they have agency, and they're well-equipped to share what it is that they need to improve their reality.”
So WESA went to PPS’s Student Voice conference to ask students what they think about the proposed changes, as well as their hopes for the district’s future. The conference brought more than 400 PPS students to Duquesne University for a day of student-led workshops and leadership development.
At a session on access and equity within PPS schools, Westinghouse Academy senior Jasmine Pierre said the district should disband its magnet school programs entirely.
“There should be magnet [options] in every single school. There should be advanced classes at every school. There should be arts at every school,” Pierre said to applause from her peers.
Pierre has been on both sides of the district’s selective magnet programs: she left Westinghouse in Homewood after her ninth-grade year to attend CAPA, the district’s performing arts school. The 6-12 school requires students to audition to attend.
“When I went, I was like, ‘This should be at the other school. I know tons of other kids that love music and art,’” Pierre told WESA.
“But it wasn't even just about the art. It was about the counselor, the help, the teachers that come in that care and are motivated, the classroom environment, the social workers,” she continued.
“There were so many kids at my neighborhood school that just didn't have that. And I didn't feel like I was deserving of it being that I lived in the neighborhood that I lived in.”
Pierre returned to Westinghouse the following year with the hope of bringing back more creativity to the school. But she said the disparities still persist, both in the resources available to her school and the school environment.
“When you have a specific school that takes the kids who are creative and the kids that make school fun, and you put them all in one school together, that kills the spirit at every other school,” she said.
“When you take the people who are strong at one thing and you keep them all together, they can't share that knowledge with their peers. And their peers can't share their knowledge with those.”
Students feel everyday funding gaps between schools
Students also expressed concerns about the limited availability of career and technical education (CTE) programs, mental health support and conflict mediation services across district schools.
“Everything is not equal. We don't have the same access that other schools have,” said Jayden Reed, a senior at UPrep.
Reed, who led the Student Voice session on equity and access, pointed to CAPA and Taylor Allderdice High School in Squirrel Hill — the district’s largest high school — as schools that have long had more available resources, such as advanced courses.
“And I know it's probably due to our small population [at UPrep], but I feel like we only have a small population because we are not funded equally,” Reed said.
UPrep is slated to become a STEM-focused middle school feeding into Oakland’s SciTech 9-12, currently a 6-12 magnet school, under the current school closure recommendations. The school would house a neighborhood magnet program, giving preference to students who live in the surrounding neighborhood while reserving a portion of seats for those throughout the city.
The district has said that the only way to ensure resources are spread fairly across all schools is to reduce the number of buildings the district operates. Administrators say some schools are too small to employ additional staff, meaning students there are left without access to electives and support staff is scarce.
At just 315 students last school year, UPrep Milliones is the district’s smallest high school. While Reed said that while he knows changes must occur to alleviate the funding and enrollment issues his school faces, he’d rather see it remain a high school.
Reed said students who want to influence the fate of their schools must rally together to make a change. His call for collective action resembles the theme for this year’s Student Voice conference: “Action, Impact and Legacy.”
Orli Trumbull said she recognizes the district is “trying its best” to solicit student feedback. But the Obama Academy junior said that between all of the fluctuating school closure timelines, there hasn’t been enough of a push to hear student voices.
“It's kind of framed as something that needs to happen. But there needs to be a platform,” she said, suggesting Walters visit district schools to hear from students.
Reed added that Mayor Ed Gainey should join Walters in hearing student perspectives.
“Then I feel like we can see change,” Reed said.
