New Pittsburgh Superintendent to Meet the Public

On Monday Dr. Linda Lane, Pittsburgh Public School's new superintendent, will attend a session to socialize and answer questions about her agenda for the district. A+ Schools is co-sporing the evening along with B-Pep and the Urban League. A+ Executive Director Carey Harris says the bulk of the evening will be a question and answer period with Lane and she expects attendees will want to know what kind of changes will take place under Lane, whether she'll start her own initiatives and her views on the challenges and opportunities facing the district. Harris says her organization will be looking closely at how PPS deals with the racial academic disparity gap and how Lane executes the ambitious initiatives begun by previous superintendent Mark Roosevelt. Those initiatives include the Pittsburgh Promise, a scholarship fund for graduating public school students; the Empowering Effective Teachers program which redesigns how the district hires, trains, evaluates, pays and promotes teachers; and the so called "right-sizing" of the district which entails closing and restructuring schools to fit the shrinking student population. The meet and greet with Lane takes place January 10, at 5:30 p.m. at the Creative and Performing Arts High School (CAPA) downtown.