Dejsha Demus is a 12th grader at Pittsburgh Creative and Performing Arts [CAPA 6-12], a Pittsburgh Public Schools [PPS] magnet, studying musical theater. As a student, she loves her school and believes that she receives leadership opportunities and support that she wouldn’t get elsewhere in the district.
Uneven Scales
As PPS contends with a difficult budget season, PublicSource explores the balance of resources and its effects on students’ futures.
Demus is one of the many students who chose to attend a magnet school, in her case to pursue her passion for singing. Had she not decided to enroll at CAPA, Demus would have been assigned to Perry High School on the Northside, her neighborhood school.
Demus was concerned about safety issues at Perry and felt the school did not have enough resources or opportunities for her.
“I think that if they did have those kinds of opportunities, then it would be more appealing to go to my home school,” she said.
Demus’ decision has been good for her. But the flow of high-performing students to magnets is driving some of the inequities in the district by concentrating students with economic disadvantages and special needs in neighborhood schools, education advocates believe. The process by which the district rescinds magnet admissions, meanwhile, tends to send many more Black students back to neighborhood schools, worsening racial tilts.
School locations, demographics and resources tip the scales on academic outcomes in PPS
How students get into — and can be booted out of — PPS magnets
“One student got a letter from Obama… to say, ‘You’re at risk.’ It was a student that struggled with anxiety and being stressed about everything. And so the parent contacted me, freaked out, and said, ‘Now she’s going to just give up. She’s like, I can’t. I’m gonna get kicked out anyway, why should I even try?'”
Pam Harbin, PPS board member
Students in PPS are assigned to neighborhood schools based on where they live, but those who seek more ambitious programming can apply to magnet schools or magnet programs within schools.
Magnets, which allow students to pursue special interests or career goals, are not specific to any neighborhood and students who reside anywhere in the district can apply. All magnets, except CAPA, enroll students based on a lottery system. Additional weight is given to students who fulfill criteria based on where they live, family income, attendance and suspensions.
Currently, there are 13 magnet schools and seven neighborhood schools with magnet programs in PPS.
To enroll at CAPA, students must undergo an audition process or provide a portfolio. Other high school magnet admissions require students to have at least 90% attendance in the prior year, a 2.5 GPA and score at least basic on their most recent Pennsylvania System of School Assessment exams.
Admission to the district’s magnet program does not guarantee a permanent spot. Students’ magnet admissions can be rescinded if they fail to meet one or more of these criteria:
- Failure to maintain 90% or higher attendance
- Failure to maintain a 2.0 GPA
- Receiving more than one suspension of four days or longer, or being suspended for a cumulative total of more than six days.
Once a student is determined to be at risk of removal from a magnet program, they are notified and issued a contract with a plan for improvement for the next semester. If the student does not meet the contract goals, their magnet admission is rescinded and they are reassigned to their neighborhood school. A student whose magnet admission has been rescinded cannot reapply to the same magnet school or program.
Data requested by PublicSource show that PPS rescinded 213 magnet admissions between 2018 and 2023. No admissions were rescinded during the school year 2019-20 because of the pandemic.
Efforts to change policy have seen little results
“When I was first on the board … there were two students, two Black female students that had IEPs and they were kicked out of Obama. I ask them, ‘What happened?’ And they said, ‘We're too stupid to be in Obama.’”
Pam Harbin, PPS board member
Harbin, co-chair of the board’s Policy Committee, said the committee has been trying to change the magnet admission and rescission policy to make it more equitable and inclusive, but the administration has been “actively blocking any efforts to have a meaningful discussion for the last three years.”
“There are students that are being denied entry into and being kicked out of magnets just based on our current criteria of our magnet policy,” said Harbin.
Allderdice and Westinghouse, 3 miles away, are worlds apart in AP classes, teacher experience, student disadvantage
Jamie Piotrowski, board member and chair of the Policy Committee, said such policies are difficult to change because they come under administrative regulation, which the board does not vote on.
In September, PPS released its first equity audit that suggested that using attendance as a key weight for magnet admission could entrench cycles of poverty and create a system of inequity.
The committee has been having conversations about the necessity of rescissions and ways to expand and retain students in magnet programs.
Christine Cray, director of student services reforms at PPS, said the district’s magnet office has had multiple conversations about changes to the administrative regulations and the policy, through a lens of equity, and made data-based recommendations to the administration.
How is it discriminatory?
“I feel like I'm in a bad school because kids are getting kicked out of schools and being brought here. That's how we are viewed. That's how we are portrayed. Like you're staying here if you get in trouble somewhere else.”
Scalea Chapman, junior at Perry High School
Harbin said the district policy effectively excludes students with limited English proficiency, students in foster care, students experiencing homelessness and students with physical and intellectual disabilities from entering magnet programs.
Among all high schools in PPS, CAPA students are least likely to be Black, come from economically disadvantaged households or have Individualized Education Plans [IEPs]. Of the 845 students enrolled at CAPA, less than 10% have IEPs. By contrast, in schools like UPrep Milliones and Westinghouse Academy, 30% of students have IEPs.
“Magnets are, in effect, existing to provide schools and programs for the most privileged, most advantaged and least disabled,” said Harbin.
The district’s arts magnet CAPA 6-12 and the STEAM magnet Sci-Tech 6-12 have been criticized for excluding students who do not have access to resources at the elementary level.
Piotrowski said many elementary schools have lost music and art programs because of a lack of funding. Some students cannot afford private art and music lessons outside of school to make up for that and thus are unable to audition for the arts magnet.
“It's almost like a two-fold kind of problem — my neighborhood doesn't have the resource or I simply don't have the money and my school also doesn't have that resource,” said Piotrowski.
Magnets are, in effect, existing to provide schools and programs for the most privileged, most advantaged and least disabledPam harbin
The rescission process, too, includes “a combination of unlawful practice and practice that is discriminatory,” Harbin said.
She said the policy rescinds student admissions if they have been suspended for more than six days, effectively discriminating against students with disabilities.
Cray said schools identify at-risk students early in the year to ensure parents are not blindsided and that they receive appropriate notifications and meaningful support.
Higher need, lower experience: Pittsburgh’s tenured teachers cluster in best-supported schools
Students in the district with disabilities who have been suspended for more than eight days get a process called a manifestation hearing to determine whether their behavior is actually a result of their disability or the result of their IEP not being followed. However, according to the magnet school policy, students can be removed if they have been suspended only for six days. This gap means some students have their magnet admissions rescinded without meeting the threshold for a hearing that could vindicate them.
Cray said the administration consults with the English language learners and special education departments to ensure that students get the support they need before being removed.
She said even when students are identified for removal, most ultimately improve their performance and their general engagement to remain in the magnet program.
The district has adopted strategies such as attendance programs, family meetings and tutoring programs, along with asking schools to provide additional data to minimize the number of student removals from magnets.
Lower expectations, fewer resources
“I love my students and want the best learning environment for them, but I had a young man that was sent back from a school and for the longest time it hurt him that he had been sent back. It hurt me and my students …I think that this is a problem that we've created. It’s kind of like you adopted a child and then you just gave them up.”
Sean Means, teacher at Westinghouse Academy 6-12
Means thinks that the district’s magnet policy makes neighborhood schools subservient. He added the system builds a narrative that certain magnet schools have higher expectations, leading the most financially secure parents to enroll their kids there.
“I just think it creates a caste system within our district,” said Means.
When Carrick High School senior Paris Seidner walked into CAPA’s Downtown building for an event in November, she was shocked. “It looks very beautiful. It looks clean, well maintained and there’s care being done,” she said. Compared to that, she said, Carrick’s building appeared neglected.
“There's a lot of things broken … and a lot of things that need to be fixed. It's a pretty basic kind of depressing-looking high school,” said Seidner.
Seidner added her school had a reputation for violence and its students don’t focus because they think their school doesn’t offer them opportunities. Students in other neighborhood schools have voiced similar sentiments about a lack of high-quality infrastructure.
Ironically, the magnet schools that now seem to contribute to inequity were created to desegregate schools by attracting white and affluent students to Black and low-income neighborhoods with offers of special programming.
CAPA’s first building was in Homewood, a predominantly low-income and Black neighborhood. In 2003, the school moved Downtown as an arts-centric magnet. Today, only 27% of CAPA’s student population is Black, while 51% of the district’s overall student population is Black.
Rachel Lamb, a research assistant at the Center on Education Data and Policy at the Urban Institute in Washington D.C., emphasized the need to make changes in both housing and education to make magnet schools more effective. She added the district should eliminate transportation barriers and invest in schools predominantly serving students of color.
Gregory Kelly, a senior at CAPA, believes that his school gets more resources than any other school in the district.
“I just think not having the access to resources that magnet schools have can have a detrimental effect on the rest of your life,” he said.
Seidner thinks the district should support her school in a way that students can be as successful as their peers in magnet programs.
“We also are going to be growing [into] adults, working,” said Seidner. “Just because we're not in a magnet does not mean that we will not be doing something very important in the community someday.”
Lajja Mistry is the K-12 education reporter at PublicSource. She can be reached at lajja@publicsource.org.
This story was fact-checked by Elizabeth Szeto.
