Growth Mindset vs Managing Decline

PPS has been operating in a “Managing Decline” mode for a very long time. We believe that you will manifest the outcomes you expect in your planning and leadership. Every Pittsburgh resident deserves better than expecting continued decline in our schools. We must have a growth mindset.

Managing Decline
The ERS proposal advocated for establishing an automated process for closing more school buildings as future enrollment declines. This is, quite simply, a loser mindset - it is conceding the game before the starting whistle. When you operate from this perspective you will manifest your expectations, which means the district will continue to decline.

Growth Mindset
Instead, we should be planning for growth. PPS has so many of the right elements to attract students/families back into the district, but we are not managing the district in a way that achieves this. Addressing shortcomings in all of our schools to do the basics really well is a necessary component of a good plan - but we consider it the bare minimum default, not a goal to really aspire to. By doing the basics well, while also leveraging and expanding our many great additional assets in a creative way and breaking down the barriers to access them, we can propel PPS into growth.

Buildings Footprint
While our proposal recognizes the need to reduce our footprint right now to best serve our students, we advocate creative uses of most of our facilities to serve our communities better - not selling them off. This gives us options to reopen schools as our growth plan takes root and we start to need that space back. See Closed Building Uses.

Mindsets Create Realities
Our mindset must be right from the start, or we will continue to fail our students and our city.