Oliver Morrison

A Pa. school's been growing faster than any school before. I've spent the past 6 months looking into why and what it means for education in Pa. Today you can read Part I of: "Virtual Dominance: How a cyber charter school has upended K-12 education in Pa.” pennlive.com/education/2025…

@401Casey If you have the headquarters of big companies like Amazon and Microsoft there, isn't there some reason to think many of these people will kind of be forced to stay? Obviously the billionaire class can do what it wants but do you think this is enough to make them move?

All this to say: NY and CA will be fine ultimately, Washington State is in huge trouble.

As a reformed municipal bond guy two stories have fascinated me the last couple weeks and they are of course very related. Washington state implementing an income tax and the downgrade of New York City

@Malliard I think you could probably use those total SPED expenses to make a pretty good comparison. If it were me, though, I would probably talk to a couple of education finance experts to make sure it made sense.

@ORMorrison So we can't compare apples to apples? Correct?

Question for reporters covering Pennsylvania education: Why is it so hard for parents to find a simple breakdown of district vs charter vs cyber costs? Wouldn't transparency help everyone understand the debate better? I'm willing to talk with any newsroom interested.

@Malliard The district doesn't have special education 'rates' in the same way charters/cybers do. Districts pay a rate to charters/cybers based on how much $ they spent. 1200 lists those SPED expenses. The 363 form uses those expenses and their enrollment to calculate those rates.

@ORMorrison No per student. We are looking to be apples to apples remember.

@Malliard If you look on the first tab, total sped instructional expenses are listed under 1200 "special programs" expenses / column N.

@ORMorrison And where is the district special education rates?

@Malliard If you use a Vlookup function using the AUN # in column A you can put them side-by-side.

@ORMorrison Yes but I think they deserve to be side by side.

@Malliard There is another spreadsheet that has the district information. It's on the second tab here in column L: pa.gov/content/dam/co…

@ORMorrison No, I don't see district information on it. It's almost like they don't want them compared.

@karenvaites I read the piece and am not clear from your comment what part of it you had a problem with. Why do you think the evidence is clearer than what was presented in his article?

Matt Barnum’s whole schtick is to give air cover to the education establishment for its mistakes by sowing ambiguity about the increasingly-obvious. It’s a trend since 2020 (his heyday on the wrong side of an issue), and the overlap between his evolution from journalist to Air Cover Provider and Chalkbeat’s diminished influence in K-12 is nearly a circle. @elizwgreen

@NWSPittsburgh The @pgh_scanner was on it: x.com/pgh_scanner/st…

We're receiving reports across western PA and eastern OH of a loud boom and a fireball in the sky. Our satellite data suggest it was possibly a meteor entering the atmosphere.

@parthurgraff Do you know why so many districts have been choosing I-ready over products like MAP? Are there equivalent or similar products that have better research behind them?

I went down an i-Ready rabbit hole a couple weeks ago. This is a edtech platform used by ~ 1/3 of K-8 students in the country. Students are spending a massive amount of instructional time using their product. Yet, there are NO RCTs (experimental studies) and few external evaluations that demonstrate that their adaptive learning platform works 😶‍🌫️🙃 What evidence does exist? It doesn't get better..

@JayBird_531 @mookiealexander Kind of echoes what the Seahawks offense did against the dominant performance of Nacua.

@mookiealexander I was at that game where Jimmy Smith put up the 291 yards. Really one of the most dominant performances I’ve ever seen. Funny enough that was one of the few games where the Ravens offense showed up and they won. Tony Banks at qb not Dilfer.

The 2000 Ravens are maybe the greatest defense of all time given they had to carry that awful offense and gave up 36 points in a game and 291 receiving yards to Jimmy Smith.

@mookiealexander I think proximity is big, too. The Seahawks first Super Bowl vs the Steelers was in Detroit and it was definitely a Steelers home game / retirement sendoff for Jerome Bettis.

If I could unite Seahawks and Eagles fans in something for one second: Super Bowls often get blasted for having corporate crowds and juiceless atmospheres. Price plays a factor, of course. The last two Super Bowls have respectively felt like Seahawks and Eagles home games.

@DVERandy The hotel right there had original art work from local artists didn't it?

Newest episode of The Pitt the nurse makes a date to meet at the art gallery at 40th and Butler and THAT IS A WENDYS #ThePitt #HBO #Frosty

America has too many bus stops. Removing excess bus stops speeds up bus services, makes them more reliable, and reduces transit costs, all of which boosts ridership. For example: San Francisco has an average of eight stops per mile, whereas European cities tend to have only four stops per mile. Moving to a European model only adds 1–3 mins of extra walking to get to a stop. Portland saw a six percent increase in bus speeds from a project which increased average stop spacing by just 90 feet. SF boosted ridership by 14% by removing some stops. Other cities have used limited stop services to boost ridership by 25–33%! New at Works in Progress, @nithin_vejendla on a rare example of a transit reform that is at once fast, cheap, and effective. worksinprogress.co/issue/the-unit…

@shesanti @Malliard @AJLivingston7 @lfeinberg @PennLive @RepMarcAnderson @JoeDforPA @RepJamieWalsh @LyndaCulver @SenatorKimWard @SharonSedlar @Stand4Cybers @JackSkyrunner @JimBearCreek @RepGleim @PAHouseGOP @PatriotNews @CBS21NEWS @JoelDReports @AngelasInk @PAGOP @PaEdChoice If you are a CCA parent and want to chat, please feel free to email me at omorrison@pennlive.com. I've interviewed 20+ CCA parents and written about their perspectives extensively. I really do appreciate hearing from parents like you and reading your comments.

@ORMorrison @Malliard @AJLivingston7 @lfeinberg @PennLive @RepMarcAnderson @JoeDforPA @RepJamieWalsh @LyndaCulver @SenatorKimWard @SharonSedlar @Stand4Cybers @JackSkyrunner @JimBearCreek @RepGleim @PAHouseGOP @PatriotNews @CBS21NEWS @JoelDReports @AngelasInk @PAGOP Oliver, Your articles posted on Facebook have hundreds of comments from parents. Why do you think parents vehemently disagree with you? Here is a hint: Maybe you should ask them. #SchoolChoice @PaEdChoice

Pa.’s largest cyber school changed education: Here’s what .@PennLive's .@ORMorrison learned This is the final piece in the 10 part series titled “Virtual Dominance: How a cyber charter school has upended K-12 education in Pa.” pennlive.com/education/2026…

@Malliard @shesanti @AJLivingston7 @lfeinberg @PennLive @RepMarcAnderson @JoeDforPA @RepJamieWalsh @LyndaCulver @SenatorKimWard @SharonSedlar @Stand4Cybers @JackSkyrunner @JimBearCreek @RepGleim @PAHouseGOP @PatriotNews @CBS21NEWS @JoelDReports @AngelasInk @PAGOP I don't have an opinion on that. But you sent me very little information, it was very confusing (and seemed like it was missing a chart?) and linked to a datasource with a broken link. That's not enough for any reporter to get started. If you have more, share it.

@ORMorrison @shesanti @AJLivingston7 @lfeinberg @PennLive @RepMarcAnderson @JoeDforPA @RepJamieWalsh @LyndaCulver @SenatorKimWard @SharonSedlar @Stand4Cybers @JackSkyrunner @JimBearCreek @RepGleim @PAHouseGOP @PatriotNews @CBS21NEWS @JoelDReports @AngelasInk @PAGOP Yeah, but you keep trying to tear cybers apart. Clearly, district schools have more money. So, which one’s better for the taxpayers?

@Malliard @shesanti @AJLivingston7 @lfeinberg @PennLive @RepMarcAnderson @JoeDforPA @RepJamieWalsh @LyndaCulver @SenatorKimWard @SharonSedlar @Stand4Cybers @JackSkyrunner @JimBearCreek @RepGleim @PAHouseGOP @PatriotNews @CBS21NEWS @JoelDReports @AngelasInk @PAGOP This is what you sent me: "Pittsburgh SD spends $33,524.47 per student, and their charter rate is $15,314 — but when you look at the actual total budget, the real per-student cost comes out to $40,660. Big difference. Here is some information. candyappleadvocacy.com/p/the-money-my…"

@ORMorrison @shesanti @AJLivingston7 @lfeinberg @PennLive @RepMarcAnderson @JoeDforPA @RepJamieWalsh @LyndaCulver @SenatorKimWard @SharonSedlar @Stand4Cybers @JackSkyrunner @JimBearCreek @RepGleim @PAHouseGOP @PatriotNews @CBS21NEWS @JoelDReports @AngelasInk @PAGOP Read the other messages and report on it. You would try to twist my words in your story.

@Malliard @shesanti @AJLivingston7 @lfeinberg @PennLive @RepMarcAnderson @JoeDforPA @RepJamieWalsh @LyndaCulver @SenatorKimWard @SharonSedlar @Stand4Cybers @JackSkyrunner @JimBearCreek @RepGleim @PAHouseGOP @PatriotNews @CBS21NEWS @JoelDReports @AngelasInk @PAGOP Jim, I sent you a message on LinkedIn asking if you wanted to be interviewed. I didn't get an email response from you and instead got two sentence of a tip on LinkedIn messages. That's not a lot for me to go on. But please send me an email if you do want to chat.

@shesanti @AJLivingston7 @lfeinberg @PennLive @ORMorrison @RepMarcAnderson @JoeDforPA @RepJamieWalsh @LyndaCulver @SenatorKimWard @SharonSedlar @Stand4Cybers @JackSkyrunner @JimBearCreek @RepGleim @PAHouseGOP LinkedIn request from Oliver: November 14. Messages sent. Messages unread. When the questions get uncomfortable, silence gets loud. @PatriotNews @CBS21NEWS @JoelDReports @AngelasInk @PAHouseGOP @PAGOP @SenatorKimWard Why doesn't he want the truth?

Don’t come for me, come for @brotheroneill , but mark your calendars. RSVPs required to attend in person: whitewhalebookstore.com/events

@chrisbriem That's the hypothesis, anyway. But curious your thoughts on it.

@chrisbriem The cost of rebuilding the airport falls on the people who use the airport, who tend to be wealthier. It's progressive in a way that seems like it would be harder to get support for more broadly in AC because some don't see the abstract benefit of helping struggling communities?

Again, the airport loses 60% of flights -> let’s spend $2 billion to reengineer the place. Braddock, PA loses 90+% population -> let’s just continue on as if nothing happened.