Pittsburgh schools still working on bus seat gap

Pittsburgh Public Schools officials are still scrambling to find a solution to a major shortage of bus seats as thousands of students prepare to return to physical classrooms next month.

Officials said on Friday that the district will be short seats for 2,600 of the district’s students, or 1,300 per cohort, out of the 10,000 students set to resume in-person instruction on May 3.

Across all of the district schools, students receiving inperson instruction will attend via an “AA/BB Model,” meaning that one cohort of students physically attends school on Mondays and Tuesdays while the other cohort attends on Thursdays and Fridays, with the remaining three days of each attended remotely.

“We are going to continue to work as much as possible to ensure we’re able to try to get our students back in,” Chief Academic Officer Minika Jenkins said. “We will continue to work

until we have exhausted all options to get students back into the building.”

Although officials originally reported last week that there would be a 1,200 seat shortage per cohort due to a “severe” lack of bus drivers, the collection of outstanding parent surveys since then added 100 extra students, per cohort, to the gap.

While 18 of the district’s schools managed to secure transportation for all of their respective students, according to Director of Pupil Transportation Megan Patton, the 1,300 seat shortage will be spread across more than 30 of the district’s schools.

Ms. Patton said the students who fall within the gap have been identified, and their families will be notified by mail by the end of next week.

The district needs at least 200 drivers by May 3 to accommodate the students who fall in the transportation gap. At least another 350 are needed by the fall once the district returns to full inperson instruction, Ms. Patton said.

Officials said on Friday that they have identified 327 students able to use Port Authority

buses, along with 1,648 students able to walk to their schools and 241 students who aren’t eligible for transportation. But the 1,300 seat gap remains even with those allowances.

Since the shortage was announced last week, 100 seats have been released by families who were able to find alternative means of transportation. Ms. Patton asked that other families who are able to release their seats should do so by calling 412-529-HELP or visiting www.pghschools.org/Letstalk.

“We are grateful to those families who have shared their willingness to release their seat to free up space for students who need it,” Ms. Patton said.

In preparation for summer, the district also announced on Friday the launch of a post-school year learning program, dubbed Summer BOOST.

It is intended to help mitigate the effects of “learning loss” that students may experience over the coming break in addition to the previous year.

“Summer learning opportunities like Summer BOOST, are important in the fight against summer learning loss, compounded by a year of remote instruction due to the pandemic,” Outof-School Time Coordinator Melanie Claxton said. “PPS students in all grade levels will have access to a highquality summer learning experience with supports in place to network, explore, and thrive.”

The program will operate from June 22 to Aug. 4, Monday through Thursday at the following sites across the city:

• K-4 Sites: Carmalt, Faison, Langley, Minadeo

• K-7 Site: King

• Grades 5-7 Sites: Classical, Sci-Tech, South Hills

• Grades 8- 11 Sites: Brashear, CAPA, Carrick, Obama

Applications for the program are available at www.pghschools.org/summerboost, and the application deadline is 5 p.m. May 7.

Officials on Friday also announced dates for in-person commencement ceremonies for district seniors.

The majority of commencements will be held at the Petersen Events Center on the Pitt campus on June 12 and 13. Officials said two guests per student will be allowed to attend the events, and CDC recommended safety guidelines will be enforced.

The locations and dates for commencements can be found on the district’s website.

“The Class of 2021 deserves to be recognized and honored for their steadfast commitment and perseverance to continue learning remotely during a global pandemic,” Assistant Superintendent, Office of School Performance, Nina Sacco said. “It’s only right that we celebrate this class with an inperson graduation.”