Andrew Knight was featured in a University of Pittsburgh promotional post.

By Jamie Kelly, Bulletin editor
For Andrew Knight, a lot of things in his life have come full circle.
Take his education. From the time he was 7 years old, he wanted to go to the University of Pittsburgh. He was a standout athlete at the beginning of high school, playing basketball and tennis.
But at 5-foot-10, he realized basketball probably wasn’t the right choice, and while he’d gotten some attention from NCAA DIII schools for his tennis playing, it was becoming clear by the end of his sophomore year that athletics weren’t going to pay for college.
So instead, he buckled down and focused on his academics. Part of that included participating in the Bloomfield-Garfield Corporation’s College and Career Readiness Program.
The CCRP supports students as they work to meet graduation requirements, helps navigate post-secondary education choices, and provides assistance with the financial aid process. Knight ended up becoming valedictorian at Perry Traditional Academy, which meant he was able to attend Pitt, his dream school, for free.
But when he graduated, he wasn’t sure what to do. He knew he was tired of not having much money, so he thought about finding a job.
“I slowly started to realize that these weren’t things I actually wanted to do, and I was kind of forcing myself to make that choice anyway, because I thought that’s kind of how things were supposed to work,” he said. “You go to college, you get a job, you make money.”
He decided to go back to school, but he didn’t take to the policy topic like he thought he would.
After a year working with children at recreation centers across the city, he reached out to Pittsburgh Promise and enrolled in Pitt’s Master of Arts in Teaching program.
“At first it was “˜I’m not 100% sure what I want to do,'” Knight said. “Maybe I want to teach. Let’s try it out. But after, I think it was like my third week of, like, my placement. So the third week of the fall semester last year where I was like, Oh, I can’t wait to be the teacher that I needed when I was younger.”
After he earned his MAT, Knight spent the last few weeks of the school year as a long-term substitute at Allegheny Traditional Academy Middle School. He’s waiting to find out where he’ll be teaching in the fall, but as he wait to find out, he’s preparing to start work on a doctorate in education at Duquesne University.
He hopes the doctorate is another way for him to help students.
“I’ve already been taught how to teach, but this degree will help me really dig into the infrastructure of education and try to move further in, not just helping students more in the classroom, but making sure they have the necessary resources outside of the classroom,” he said.