Pittsburgh: Education and Research

View more Travel videos

Elementary and Secondary Schools

Pittsburgh Public School System's nine-member Board of Public Education underwent recent upheaval, seeking a new superintendent in 2005. Despite the temporary disruption of the change in leadership, Pittsburgh Public Schools remains dedicated to enabling its veteran, well-trained staff to give each individual child whatever is needed to help him or her grow into not only a successful student, but a socially adjusted adult who will contribute to society. In addition to the excellent mainstream education, the district offers a variety of support programs for special education needs, including speech/language support, visually impaired support, deaf or hard-of-hearing support, autistic support, multiple disabilities support, emotional and life skills support, learning support, physical support, and programs for the gifted and for early intervention. Creatively and scholastically gifted students have the Pittsburgh Gifted Center for kindergarten through eighth grade levels, then in high school the Center for Advanced Studies program is available. All gifted students get a custom-made Gifted Individualized Education Program (GEIP) designed for them in coordination with the school and the student's family. Magnet school options include the structured atmosphere of traditional academies, international studies, Montessori method schools, a baccalaureate program, vocational-technical training in computer sciences and such fields, and the CAPA program for Creative and Performing Arts. About 78 percent of teachers hold advanced degrees.

The following is a summary of data regarding the Pittsburgh Public School District as of the 2003–2004 school year.

Total enrollment: 34,167

Number of facilities elementary schools: 53

junior high/middle schools: 17

senior high schools: 10

other: 4

Student/teacher ratio: 11.4:1 Teacher salaries minimum: $35,500

maximum: $104,020

Funding per pupil: $15,514

The Diocese of Pittsburgh administers a large network of grade schools and high schools; there are more than 250 private schools and more than 85 vocational and trade schools in the region.

Public Schools Information: Pittsburgh Public Schools, 341 South Bellefield Avenue, Pittsburgh, PA 15213; telephone (412)622-3870

Colleges and Universities

The University of Pittsburgh, or "Pitt," was founded in 1787 near Fort Pitt. Originally known as Pittsburgh Academy, it is one of the nation's oldest universities. It is the area's largest four year school with a total enrollment of 26,795 in 2004. Pitt offers 118 programs including liberal arts, law, business, engineering, information science, and international studies. The University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine and Medical Complex, located in Oakland in the northwest of Pitt's campus, is foremost in the world in health administration, sports medicine, and bioresearch, and pioneered in organ transplants with the first combination heart, liver, and kidney transplant in 1989. The University of Pittsburgh spans a 132-acre urban campus with the majestic Cathedral of Learning as its centerpiece.

Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) began as Carnegie Technical Schools in 1900 by local steel magnate and philanthropist Andrew Carnegie and became known as Carnegie Mellon University after a merger with Mellon Institute in 1967. CMU offers nearly 200 bachelor's, master's, and doctoral degree programs, specializing in robotics, computer sciences, a strong fine arts department with a famous drama school, and the Tepper School of Business, rated by the Wall Street Journal as the number two business school in the world. Carnegie Mellon University has a campus in Silicon Valley, California, and one in the nation of Qatar. CMU seeks to expand its global connections with educational partnerships around the world. Its roughly 2,000 international students make up almost a quarter of the student body.

Other institutions of higher learning in Pittsburgh are Duquesne University, a Catholic University founded in 1878; Carlow College, another Catholic school, primarily for women; Robert Morris University, which emphasizes business studies and whose interns work and study at prestigious firms; Chatham College, one of the country's oldest women-only colleges having been founded in 1869; and Point Park University, a small, private, liberal arts school recently raised from college to university status. Community College of Allegheny County has four campuses and seven community centers, offers flexible scheduling and affordability, and allows thousands of students each year to transfer credits to a four-year college.

Libraries and Research Centers

The heart of Pittsburgh's library systems is the Carnegie Libraries of Pittsburgh, another gift of Andrew Carnegie. It consists of the main branch in Oakland, 18 other neighborhood branches, a Library for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, and three bookmobiles. The library has an extensive children's department and is believed to have had the first children's "storytime" in a library in 1899. On October 3, 2004, the Main Branch of the Carnegie Library held a ribbon cutting celebration for its newly renovated first floor; the Bookmobile Center was also recently remodeled. The library holds more than two million books and a plethora of computer terminals, all "Free to the Public," as Carnegie had enscribed above the doors to the Main Branch. Other features of Carnegie Libraries are a special Teens section in the new Main Branch first floor, which features a multimedia information desk, an indoor/outdoor reading deck, and a library shop and café. The library offers a Music Collection with more 12,000 books, scores, and periodicals and 30,000 recordings, featuring nineteenth and twentieth century Pittsburgh musicians prominently in the collection; an Art Collection, with more than 72,000 books, 200 periodicals, over 100,000 slides and pictures, and a growing video and DVD collection; and a Dance Collection of about 2,000 books and videos.

Carnegie Libraries of Pittsburgh also maintain a Job and Career Education Center and a Business Foundation Center. Because Pennsylvania's 2003-2004 budget reduced the library's funding by 50 percent, a nominal fee is charged for some computer classes.

The Pittsburgh area is one of the most active research and development sites in the United States, in part due to its two biggest universities, the University of Pittsburgh and Carnegie Mellon University. A joint venture of the two plus Westinghouse Electric Corp. is the Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center, established in 1986 and still continuing to develop and provide innovative software for scientific researchers nationwide.

University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) operates most of the medical research centers in the region, including the Children's Hospital General Clinical Research Center, the Cooperative Research Center for Muscular Dystrophy, the Center for Injury Research and Control, MageeWomen's Research Center (for gynecology, obstetrics, and reproductive health studies), the Center for Neuroscience, a new Center For BioSecurity, and many others. Non-medical research involving the University of Pittsburgh includes a variety of centers, such as the Learning Research and Development Center, the Center for Urban and Social Research, the Chevron Science Center (for chemistry), the Small Business Development Center, and the Joseph M. Katz School of Business Institute for Entrepreneurial Excellence.

Carnegie Mellon University has no less than 77 research centers of all disciplines under its umbrella, some of which are jointly operated with the University of Pittsburgh and/or local businesses. Some of note are its Robotics Engineering Consortium, Art Conservation Research Center, Bosch Institute for Applied Studies in International Management, the Steinbrenner Institute for Environmental Education and Research, and the Institute for Complex Engineered Systems. A few of the most recent and most important research centers are CyLab, which has launched a security initiative to protect PC users from cyber terrorists and hackers; four separate Robotics research facilities, and the Software Engineering Institute (SEI), which was founded by a grant from the U.S. Department of Defense. Among other research institutes are Seagate, a computer and electronics company; the federal government's Pittsburgh Rehabilitation Research and Development Center; the Pittsburgh Research Laboratory; the National Energy Technology Laboratory; and the Pennsylvania Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit. Pittsburgh today is home to more than 200 institutional and commercial research centers and laboratories.

Public Library Information: Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, 4400 Forbes Avenue, Pittsburgh, PA 15213-4080, telephone (412)622-3114