Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Music icon Jon Batiste helped Duolingo triple the viewership of its annual Duocon demonstration in September, and the popular teaching app shows no signs of slowing down. The East Liberty company added an additional 13 million monthly users this quarter, carrying an associated bump in paid subscribers and revenue. Duolingo reported $193 million in revenue for the quarter, a 40% increase from last year.

Freshman enrollment is down 5% at colleges nationally this fall compared to fall 2023 — the first nationwide downturn in first-year students since the COVID-ridden fall 2020 semester, according to preliminary data shared by National Student Clearinghouse Research Center on Wednesday. Declines are more pronounced at public institutions, which saw their first-year student populations fall 8.5% in a year, and private nonprofit institutions, which experienced a 6.5% drop. Community colleges, meanwhile, only saw a 0.4% decline in first-year students — lessening the national average drop. A nearly 6% drop in 18-year-old freshmen accounts for a large portion of these declines, according to NSC. That figure indicates that fewer high school seniors opted to attend college after high school graduation.

Pittsburgh’s housing market hit the brakes this year, with home sales plunging 12.7% year-over-year — one of the steepest drops in the nation. According to the latest ReMax National Housing Report, Pittsburgh is one of the top five major U.S. markets where the number of closed transactions declined the most in September compared to the same month the year before. “The market has cooled down big-time here in Pittsburgh over the past year,” said Dustin Nulf, owner of Nulf Real Estate on Washington’s Landing. While buyer demand has dropped, the inventory of houses coming on the market for sale also has piled up this year, creating a 50% increase in housing supply in both Allegheny County and the city of Pittsburgh, according to West Penn Multi-List data. #housing #realestate #pittsburgh #affordablehousing

Gov. Josh Shapiro unveiled a nearly $600 million plan Friday designed to pump new life into Downtown Pittsburgh at a time when the city center is reeling from high office vacancies, foreclosures, plummeting property values and concerns about crime. The 10-year strategy will be fueled by $62.6 million in state investment; more than $40 million from a local coalition that includes top businesses, foundations and all three of the city’s sports teams; and $22.1 million through the city’s Urban Redevelopment Authority. Those contributions are expected to spur an additional $376.9 million in private investment — largely involving the conversion of seven Downtown buildings for residential reuse, including the historic Gulf Tower. But there are also initiatives to help fund additional police officers Downtown, to aid those suffering from mental illness or drug addiction, and to create a team to curb youth violence. #pittsburgh #downtown

 A Pittsburgh-based health system shuttered a physician’s office in this speck of an Allegheny River town in southeast Venango County, leaving the borough without a doctor for the first time in decades and elderly residents trying to figure out how to get to medical appointments. UPMC’s recent closure of the Emlenton Area Family Practice on Main Street left the borough’s 650 residents without a doctor, which is being felt most acutely by elderly and disabled residents of a subsidized housing complex across the street. Clinic patient Betty Bishop, who lives in the complex, said she now has to figure out how to get a ride to her UPMC doctor’s office in Shippenville, Clarion County, about 20 miles away. “I have a friend that drives, but she’s 80 something and has bad hips,” said Ms. Bishop, a retired carbide shop worker who is 95 years old. “I’m kind of stuck. It’s awful.” #healthcare #rural

PPG announced Thursday morning that it has reached a deal to sell its architectural paints business in the U.S. and Canada in a transaction valued at $550 million. Headquartered in Cranberry, with more than 6,000 employees and 750 company-owned stores, the paints division is likely the most recognizable output for the average retail customer, who is used to seeing brands like Glidden on the shelves of hardware stores. It is being sold to American Industrial Partners, a New York-based private equity investment firm. PPG’s U.S. and Canadian paints business will be among the biggest in American Industrial’s portfolio, which includes dozens of companies in industrial, logistics, chemicals, and other businesses. #layoffs #pittsburgh #ppg https://lnkd.in/gJ5jgccU

School districts across the region continue to grapple with ongoing staffing shortages as they gear up for the start of school, many reporting lower numbers of teachers, bus drivers and support staff. The problem has been persistent since the start of the pandemic, leading to canceled bus routes and teachers taking on extra classrooms when a substitute is not available. This year, 48% of 276 superintendents from across the state interviewed for the Pennsylvania School Boards Association’s State of Education report identified staffing shortages as a top issue. And of those interviewed, nearly 88% were experiencing shortages of substitute teachers, almost 70% were struggling to find instructional aides, nearly 67% said special education teachers and staff were difficult to find, 62% reported challenges in hiring transportation staff and almost 41% had challenges hiring regular education teachers. #backtoschool #staffshortage #teacher #vacancies

Supermarket retailer Giant Eagle Inc. announced Monday that it has agreed to sell all of its GetGo convenience stores to a Canadian outfit, which operates more than 16,700 similar stores globally.

Pittsburgh Public School officials on Tuesday got their first look at several different scenarios that could drastically change the district’s footprint in coming years. The scenarios, presented by Massachusetts-based education consulting firm Education Resource Strategies during the district’s education committee meeting, are the next steps in Pittsburgh Public’s facilities utilization plan, a blueprint that could lead to the closure and consolidation of some school buildings as PPS faces declining enrollments and a growing budget deficit. Under the proposal, 16 existing schools would close, 14 would change their grade reconfiguration, six magnet schools would phase out and become neighborhood schools and five new programs would open in existing buildings

Downtown’s historic Frick Building is undergoing a resurgence as its owner empties out the Gulf Tower just blocks away in anticipation of converting that structure to apartments and a luxury hotel. Pittsburgh law firm Robert Peirce & Associates will be relocating to the Frick Building at 437 Grant St. from the Gulf Tower early next year. Rugby Realty, the owner of both, is repositioning the latter structure for the proposed conversion. The new 10-year deal is one of five recent leases that Rugby has signed with tenants to relocate to the 122-year-old Frick Building, which was built by industrialist Henry Clay Frick. Together, the leases total about 35,000 square feet, boosting the historic building’s occupancy to about 85%.