Pittsburgh Public considers expanding community schools
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Pittsburgh Langley K-8 has a new closet for students who need clothes or “school appropriate” attire.
It also has a new backpack program, providing snacks and other supplies to students who need them.
Thoseare some examples — albeit small ones — of changes recently instituted at Langley in Sheraden, one of Pittsburgh Public Schools’ five inaugural “community schools.” Since the schools were officially designated last year, district and school leaders have been studying and coordinating what support services are needed in those buildings, crafting memorandums of understanding with various community partners and drawing up contracts for the social services, programs and resources provided.
Errika Fearbry Jones, chief of staff to superintendent Anthony Hamlet, described this phase of the model implementation as necessary, even if it doesn’t seem “sexy.” She said the district hopes to expand the community school concept to others in the city within the next year, although she offered no official timeline.
“There’s pressure to grow because there is such a need, people want to get on board, but we also want to do it in a way that really honors the process,” she said. “If you’re going to do this and give this to parents and give this to kids and a community, the worst thing you can do is not be able to sustain it.”
After the school board passed a community schools policy last year, Langley was designated as one of the first, along with Arsenal 6-8 in Lawrenceville, Lincoln PreK-5 in Larimer and Faison K-5 andWestinghouse High School in Homewood. As community schools, they will house within their buildings social services and additional resources for students and their families, which couldrange from things like adult education to medical or dental care. Twenty-one city schools applied to become one last year, and even more have expressed interest since then, Ms. Fearbry Jones said.
In May, the district conducted a needs assessment at each of the schools and got responses from more than 1,400 teachers, students and parents from the five schools. Teachers requested more supports for students to perfect their communication skills or to receive mental health services; students requested movie nights and more after-school activities; parents and the community partners who work with the district to provide the services talked about things like afterschool tutoring and summer programs.
“What we believe in regards to a community school is that