A Quick Guide to Schools in Pittsburgh

When we still thought we would live out a good chunk of our lives in Pittsburgh, I had done a lot of research on school options for the kids. Now I find a lot of my friends going through the same process of doubts, questions and research as their kids grow older. So, here's a post summarizing the various options, my opinions and some facts about school education in the Burgh.

At age 3 (preschool):

a) Daycare/Preschool combination option: Places like Kindercare, Tendercare, Brightside, Rodef Shalom, JCC, etc (pretty much any daycare that caters to the 3-5 year old population) integrate a preschool within their daycare. The great advantage is that the kids are taken care of till about 6 or 7pm, for a price that varies by the center. On average, one can anticipate about a $1000/ month in expenses.

b) Public preschool: Pittsburgh Public Schools offers free preschool for 3-5 year old kids. Advantages: it's free; it's a great way of finding out about the school for kindergarten and above (after 5 years of age). Major disadvantage: school runs only till about noon or so, forcing one to find other options for after-school care.
For nearly all these preschools, admission is by application to the assigned school (based on postal address) or by lottery (eg. Montessori). Don't assume that just because you got in to a great school via the preschool lottery, that you're all set for kindergarten. Many schools require you to re-participate in the lottery system after the child turns 5 for a kindergarten admit.

At age 5 (kindergarten and at 6, elementary):

a) Pittsburgh Public Schools (assigned school): Based on one's postal address, one falls into different school districts, meaning that there's an assigned school where one's kids automatically are ensured admission. Pittsburgh inner city school districts get a lot of flak from those living in the suburbs, but in general, I have found that the schools in Squirrel Hill and Shadyside are pretty well-regarded. Many parents I have spoken to assure me that schools like Colfax or Minadeo (both in Squirrel Hill) are certainly comparable to any in the suburbs.
Nothing much needs to be done by the parents to ensure admission to their kids: You take the kid's birth certificate and some proofs of residence (a detailed document list is found on the PPS website) over to the school before some particular date in summer (the academic term starts in Aug) and they will register the kid. Before school starts, there'll be open houses and meet-and-greets where the prospective parents and students can meet the teachers and other school families.
This is the simplest and most stress-free method.
However, you may not be happy with your assigned school. In which case, you could find a close relative who does live in a school district that you like, and that can enable you to put your kid in the new school, after assigning the close relative as guardian. Or you could try the following other options:

b) Pittsburgh Public Schools (Magnet school): Magnet schools are those that emphasize a certain aspect of education, such as languages, science & tech, arts, music, you name it. There are many elementary schools that are Magnet, such as Dilworth (special emphasis on arts and music), Linden(special emphasis on a foreign language, such as German or Mandarin), Montessori (a special teaching type) and so on. There is no geographical restriction for application to these schools. To apply, wait for the application forms to come online on the PPS website by October of the previous year, browse through their offerings (each school describes its philosophy, special points etc), pick three that you like, submit the completed form and your list of top-3 favorite schools to the PPS office by December. Lottery to these schools take place in Jan and you will know where your child will be placed by February end. Magnet schools, being part of PPS, are also free.

c) Charter schools: these are not part of the PPS, yet they are not exactly separate from them, either. They follow their own curricula, but are still considered enough a part of PPS that their graduating high-school students will be eligible for the Pittsburgh Promise. The curriculum depends on the school. For instance, the Frick Environmental Charter School (my favorite of all) stresses on the importance of nature and environmental consciousness in the development of kids. Entrance is by lottery. Competition can be fierce. For instance, the ECS admission rate is 7%, lower than that of Yale University.Parents pay a nominal fee for tuition and food.

For both magnet and charter schools, preference is given to applicants with siblings already in the school ("sibling preference") and city of Pittsburgh residents.

d) Private schools: pay and learn. School fees can vary widely. But nearly all cost more than $10,000/ year. Scholarships are available for those in need of financial assistance.

My opinions:
I am a big fan of the PPS. So my plan for my kids was to send them to either their assigned school (Minadeo) or apply for Magnet schools (Montessori and Dilworth were the first two on my list). I felt that the money saved during elementary school education would be better used either for private schooling at the high school stage or even college. Some of my friends also advocated private schooling in a girls-only school for their daughters during the middle school years and this is certainly a point that should be considered.

Hiya Pluto!

Excited about New Horizons!

What will we see on Tuesday?

Beautiful Altars

To my Indian and Indian-origin readers in the US, my friends Swati and Pushkar have started selling beautiful altars that they design and make themselves.

If you are interested in an exclusive and original altar for your idols, go check out their website! They're the best!

GoKool Altars. 

Warbler Watching

 I've written a bit about warblers before. These are small, loud birds that perch high on trees and flit around. They are also really difficult to spot. RK has been obsessing about them for a few years now and last year, finally, at Presque Isle, we managed to catch a few glimpses of these li'l critters. The birds start flying from South America to Canada every spring and they rest along the US shoreline of the Great Lakes before crossing the lakes. So, in protected places along the shoreline, you can find large numbers of warblers congregated during the first couple of weeks of May and these can be spotted more easily than usual because leaf growth on trees is still quite sparse. By Memorial Day, however, most trees have their foliage and these little birds are nearly impossible to spot in their natural habitat.

We made a week-long road trip to the midwest during the first weekend of May and camped overnight near Magee Marsh on our way to Illinois.

Magee Marsh is about 40m from Toledo, OH

Magee Marsh, right on the Lake Erie shoreline,  used to be hunting land at one point of time, before it got turned over the government. Now it's part of the Ottawa National Refuge for Wildlife and in close proximity to East Harbor and Maumee State Parks. This is a truly fantastic place for bird-watchers of all ages. The design too is very kid-friendly: on one side of the parking lot is the beach, where kids can hang out and on the other side is the bird trail.

Relaxing at Lake Erie, right by Magee Marsh

This trail is what makes Magee Marsh so popular, a wooden boardwalk cutting right through the marsh which one can walk on, and observe birds and wildlife. The company is great, usually a bunch of experienced bird watchers and people are very friendly, taking trouble to show you the birds they spotted and telling you a bit about them.

Boardwalk trail through the marsh at Magee Marsh. 

Yes, it can tend to get a bit tame, not to mention overcrowded. Nonetheless, it's a great place to begin birding.

There's also a wooded region between the lake and the trail which is home to some very beautiful birds.

The most common birds one sees, other than the American robin, are the red shouldered blackbirds and Canada geese. May appears to be a time for Canada goslings to waddle around

Those little lumps of greenish-brown are goslings!

While the male red-shouldered blackbirds are really easy to identify, the female stumped me for a long time. I knew that females had a yellow streak, instead of a red shoulder, but I didn't realize that those were immature females.

Immature female red-winged/ red-shouldered blackbird. Image from Wiki.

Apparently, the mature female red shouldered blackbird looks like this:

Mature female blackbird

Who would have guessed that it's a blackbird, right? RK challenged me to identify this bird and it took me the better part of a day to finally figure it out.

We saw our first warbler when, while pulling into the Magee Marsh (MM, for short. I'm getting tired of spelling this out) parking lot, we spotted a lady with a dog intently observing something high up on a tree. So of course, we pulled out our binos as well and guess what we found?

A yellow-rumped warbler!

This was the first time either of us had ever seen one of these, so there was high excitement all around. Look at that pale yellow patch on his little butt and that little turmeric tilak on his forehead! Many birds also have a bright yellow patch on the breast, but some didn't. Here's a picture of the female, showing the yellow breast, so perhaps only the females have it, but the males have the forehead patch? I need to find out.

Female yellow-rumped warbler. Looks a bit like a sparrow with touches of yellow, right?

These birds are supposedly the most common warblers in MM. And certainly we saw plenty.

We spotted many tree swallows (and even a nest!), gulls, terns, and a downy woodpecker. Way out in the lake, a flock of birds swimming in the water caught our attention. They had tucked their heads away in between their wings, perhaps to protect themselves from the wind. Ram initially thought they were pintail ducks, because of their pointed tails. But one of them raised his head and showed himself to be quite ruddy. They were ruddy ducks!

Downy woodpecker. Image from Audubon

Male ruddy duck. Image from Wiki

Some distance away were hooded merganser ducks, identifiable by their black heads with crest (presumably white colored, though we couldn't tell the color from the distance).

Hooded merganser duck. Image from www.ducks.org

We saw warbling vireos. I think this bird has become one of my favorites. I promise you, you have heard it, if you have spent even a few minutes outdoors during spring time in some wooded area. It is loud, lives up to its name and sings almost constantly. You'd think a bird with such a voice and general loud personality would have an equally loud and colorful appearance, but you'd be wrong. The warbling vireo is probably one of the most nondescript birds I have seen. In fact, its very dull appearance is itself one of its identifying features.

The warbling vireo

In East Harbor State Park, where we camped, I tracked a couple of vireos and found their nest! They were still building it at the time, but the only reason why I started tracking them was because the birds were so loud! If you're interested, go to East Harbor State Park, near camp site A110, and walk towards the camp site right behind it. There, in a small tree, by the park bench, is the nest. It's likely that you'll not spot it immediately because it was completely hidden among leaves. But never fear- the nest builders will sing loudly enough for you to figure out where it is eventually.

A few more birds that we saw and that were truly spectacular:

Canada Warbler. Very similar to Magnolia Warbler (see below). But
with shorter streaks in the front (almost like a necklace). To
see a Canada warbler, go to Magee Marsh. Near the toilets behind the
parking lot, on the path to the beach, is a thicket. We saw 2-3 birds flitting
around over there, perhaps nesting.

Magnolia warbler. Image from Wiki.
Pretty similar to Canada (see above). But
found on trees, near the marsh. Note
also the different eye rings/ eye brows

This is the Blackburnian warbler. What colors, no?! Found on trees by the boardwalk through the Marsh.

Blackburnian warbler

The Black-throated Blue warbler. There's been a decline in numbers, so this bird is considered to be a "priority" bird by the Audubon society. Found it on the trees by the boardwalk.

Black-throated blue warbler

Cape May warbler. Note the red eye-patch and the black streaks down the breast.  Image from Wiki

Palm warbler. Yellow rump, ruddy crest. Best identifying feature: tail flicks. Apparently, the only warbler that demonstrates this trait.

Bay breasted warbler. 

Black and white warbler

Nashville warblers look similar to female redstarts (well, perhaps they don't, looking at these two pictures side-by-side. I confused the two up anyway), but have a red patch on their heads:

Female redstart

Nashville warbler

Red mark on the head of the Nashville warbler.
Image from Audubon

Tennessee warbler: getting harder and harder to identify between
all these species, no? In fact, we are not certain we actually
saw this one.

Yellow warbler. Very common in Magee Marsh. 

Nest of yellow warbler

Common yellow-throated warbler

Let me just write down the other birds we saw, since the list is long and I'm sure this blog post is huge already:

Great Blue Heron

Coots

Gnatcatcher

Field Sparrow

Song Sparrow

Cormorants

Wood ducks (in nest!)

Red bellied woodpecker

Nuthatch

Killdeer and its babies

Cat birds

Eastern kingbird

Mourning warbler (seen by others, not us)

White crowned sparrow

We also saw many turtles and even a water snake. The kids were thrilled!

This blog post has gone on long enough, so I'll leave you with this image of the nest of a bald eagle (about two houses from the ice cream shop near Magee Marsh, if anybody's interested)

Nest of bald eagle.Also saw both eagles within nest, but couldn't get picture.

Just-discovered on Netflix

 Much Ado About Nothing (2013)

Much Ado is supposed to be the story of Claudio and Hero. But really, Beatrice and Benedict take over right from the beginning. They have everything going for them: looks, wit, comedy, and high drama. And Benedict is a real man- he doesn't rely on anybody else's opinion or on Don Pedro's intervention to get him his girl. Claudio, on the other hand, is such a boy. No wonder nobody remembers Claudio/Hero.

Of course, it's also more uncomfortable to think of them... one wonders if one shouldn't pull aside Hero and ask her, "Really?  Aren't you settling for less? Why not wait a bit to find someone who is a bit more mature?"

I had watched the Kenneth Branagh version some time ago. But I really like this modern retelling.
 

A Wild and Wonderful Trip

West Virginia is exotic. People might laugh when they read this, but truly, its hills, forests, rivers, even its cuisine and its people with their lovely Southern drawl all make a visitor feel like they might, with a bit of imagination, be able to picture themselves as being in old-time America, as the country must have been a long, long time ago.

I find it fascinating that just a one hour drive west of Pittsburgh can get us into a place which is so typically Southern, in terms of accents and lassitude, so typically Appalachian, in terms of scenery and cuisine and so typically rural American, in terms of obesity and general views of strangers.

Last weekend, RK and I decided we had to do something fun, get away from home and Pittsburgh for a while. So we called a bunch of state parks nearby and found one which had vacancies available for that very night, all the way in Southern WV, called Twin Falls State Park Resort.



Twin Falls State Park, circled in red. Pittsburgh is all way to the north, near that corner of the rectangle, where you might imagine I79 and I70 meeting.

It was a beautiful drive. At this time of year, not all trees have leaves. But the trees that have "woken up" are in full bloom. Deeper south, the flowering Dogwoods were out in full force, dotting a brown landscape with dashes of white or delicate pink.



My favorite flowering tree. Is there anything more captivating than a dogwood in bloom? Picture from an online source

Very common and extremely beautiful were also these pink flowered-trees, which I think were Eastern Redbuds

The Eastern Redbud, another beautiful tree. Pic is not mine... somewhere online. So much for correct referencing...

We stayed at the resort in a room with some wonderful views

View from bedroom window

View from porch of hotel room

RK took the kids for a little walk while I got ready. There were a bunch of acorns on the ground beneath a few trees. Ani and Durga collected many of them. There were also many squirrels bounding from one tree to another. Durga looked at them, clutched her acorns to her heart and squealed, "No! Mine!"
:)

A mile or so from the hotel room was this lake. Some deer had come to visit. Can you see them?

All the way on the far side, near the trees are three yellow dots. A family of deer.

On the way, we saw this little guy:

Male ovenbird. Image from allaboutbirds.com

RK thinks these ovenbirds are probably also found in our neighborhood Frick Park. But I guess some times, some birds wait for you to come all the way to a different part of the world before they let you see them.

We also saw many turkey vultures.

Kinda ugly, no? Huge bird.



It was past 11am by the time we reached the two falls this state park is named for. There's a mile-long hike between the falls, and the kids loved splashing in the puddles on the way.

A snapshot of some of the surrounding forest

The second fall.

Look! You can get behind it!

From behind the falls

Awesome trip, all in all.

Wisdom.... slow in gain, hopefully long-lasting

When my son Ani was born, I exclaimed to my mom, "You know, if I had been born 50 years ago, I would have probably died in labor. I would have been one of those statistics. Thank God, I was born when I was"

You know why? Because I was told that going too many days past your due date (I had gone 10) was risky, that I ought to get pitocin, then I was suggested an epidural and then I had a C-section because my labor stalled and the fetal heart rate dropped.

Now, I am realizing that none of those need to have happened. That there were alternatives to pitocin and to epidurals and that I could have gotten the natural childbirth that I wanted.

I'm watching "The Business of Being Born" and groaning with all this knowledge that has come too late for me. Hopefully I can share this with other new moms and help them make choices that are right for them.

I have to keep reminding myself:

a) It's okay that I missed out on this experience (twice). I have to make up for it by being the best mom I can to my kids (even if I yell at them once in a while).
b) It's okay that even an educated woman like me who's online 90% of her day reading and critiquing things didn't know about these alternatives. It doesn't make me kinda stupid. It just makes me part of the extremely large number of other women who trust their doctors and health care system without questioning it at all.

Suddenly, I realize that the biggest lesson I need to take from this whole thing is that I shouldn't stop questioning anybody, especially doctors. Even when my own husband is one and even if he suggests that I trust my doctor.

*****************************************************************************************

Update: Aaarrrgghhh.... the more I watch this video, the more idiotic I feel.
I need to stop obsessing about all the ways I could have changed the course of my labors. Because seriously, at the end of the day, I have two kids who are healthy and happy and it's my job to keep them that way.
And what has happened has happened. And whatever happens, happens for the best.

So move ON, already, Varsh. Snap out.