Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

Pittsburgh Public Schools has a rating of just a "B-" on niche.com but gets A's for the quality of Teachers, so not all is lost.

This is a brilliant summary of the PPS experience by a graduate of PPS who works throughout the public, private, and suburban districts:

*The best way to describe the difference between PPS and surrounding districts is that the floor for academic performance is a lot lower, and the very tippy top of the academic ceiling is a little lower. If you have a kid who is really struggling in school or has specific needs, you will see them struggle even more in PPS under most circumstances and I suggest looking private or moving to the suburban districts. If you want your kid to get into specifically Ivy League colleges, private and top tier districts have relationships with the admissions departments in those places that go a little further.

Otherwise, whatever dreams your kid has is within reach with a PPS education, especially if they're in one of the better high schools (Sci-Tech, Allderdice magnet, CAPA) or enrolled in the CAS program. My graduating class at one of the worst PPS high schools had three pharmacists, multiple social workers/counselors, a few teachers (hello), a few physical therapists, two engineers, and a single architect. It also had like a 60% dropout rate. Is it a "bad" school by every numerical measure? Yeah. Did it stop the kids who had solid home lives from succeeding? No. That's the duality you grapple with when talking about PPS.

My suggestion to all parents is to try PPS first. Find a magnet elementary school you like, ride it out, and reevaluate at middle school time. The differences between elementary schools are nowhere near as vast as high schools. Your life will probably also change a ton between now and then, and you can rerun the algebra to see if your priorities need changing.*

With more people switching to remote work and looking for larger homes with access to parks and trails, there has never been a better time to move to Pittsburgh. More affordable houses conveniently situated around these amenities and those of other large American cities, including beloved sports stadiums such as Heinz Field, home of the fabled Pittsburgh Steelers, make Pittsburgh a phenomenal destination for the present and the future.

zedazeni
Living in Pittsburgh
1y ago
🦉🦉🦉🦉

My backstory:

Born and raised in St Louis; university in Fayetteville, AR, Alexandria, VA (DC metro).

My partner (M 27) and I (M 27) moved to Pittsburgh around two months ago from the DC area.

Living in DC was great, except for the never-ending traffic and the skyrocketing cost of living (specifically housing and restaurants).

We visited Pittsburgh for the first time last April and found that the architecture was charming, the nature was abundant, and the city seemed proud without being pretentious.

After having lived here now for nearly two months, the move was definitely worth it—we own a gorgeous 114 year old house for a fraction of what it would’ve cost in DC, have access to dozens of great restaurants within a 15 min walk that cost half of what we were paying for similar fare back in our DC suburb, the traffic is at the very least manageable, and the hills provide such a nice break, especially after living in the seemingly endless suburban expanse of the DC metropolitan area.

What’s more, PGH has the most agreeable climate of any city I’ve lived in, perhaps Tbilisi, Georgia (the country) had a more temperate but still distinctly 4-season climate.

As for your points:

1: it depends on the neighborhood. Squirrel Hill, Lawrenceville, Bloomfield, East Liberty, the Strip District and Oakland have a lot of younger people since they’re close to Carnegie-Mellon University (CMU) and the University of Pittsburgh. The farther away, the more suburban it gets. Cranberry is the new “it” for suburbs, but Robinson and Ross are pretty suburban as well. Overall, you’re not going to be the only younger person in your neighborhood, and with the universities here and Google’s presence, there’s not going to be a shortage of young people coming and going.

2: hiking is great. Frick Park has a lot of good trails. Allegheny County Parks has its own app for hiking, and the parks are huge. If you’re wanting more, there’s a few state parks within a 90 min drive of Pittsburgh as well, so you’ll have no problem going for a long or short hike.