The short version
One lesson will probably make you worse for a fortnight. A series of lessons with practice in between will make you better for years. Almost everything that goes wrong with golf instruction comes from people buying the first thing and expecting the second.
34 courses around Pittsburgh have a teaching professional on staff. 18 of those also have a driving range on site, which matters more than it sounds, and I will come back to why.
Why one lesson backfires
A good instructor watching you for an hour will find four or five things. If they tell you all of them, you walk to the range with a head full of instructions and no ability to execute any of them, and your next round is a disaster. You conclude lessons do not work.
What actually happened is you got a diagnosis and no treatment.
The instructors worth paying will give you one thing to work on and refuse to give you the second until the first is embedded. If you leave a first lesson with a list, that is a signal about the instructor rather than about your swing.
How many you need
Three to six is the usual honest answer for someone starting out, spaced a week or two apart so you can practise between them. That spacing is the active ingredient. A lesson without practice after it is entertainment.
This is why the range matters. If your course has one, a lesson turns into a habit. If it does not, you need somewhere else to go, and the friction of driving to a second location is what kills most people's practice.
What it costs around here
Private lessons in the Pittsburgh area typically run somewhere between fifty and a hundred dollars an hour, depending on the instructor's credentials and demand. Group clinics cost considerably less per head and are underrated for beginners, because watching other people fail at the same thing is genuinely instructive and much less lonely.
If you are completely new, ask about a beginner package. Bundled range time is normally better value than paying for lessons one at a time, and it removes the decision about whether to go and practise.
What a lesson cannot fix
Equipment that does not fit you. A grip you refuse to change because it feels weird. Playing four times a year.
Instructors will not usually say this directly, so I will: if you play once a month and never practise, lessons are not the constraint. Frequency is. Play nine holes after work twice a month and you will improve faster than someone taking monthly lessons and playing the same amount.
Juniors
Several of these courses run junior clinics and summer camps, generally June through August. Places are limited and they fill during the spring, so a call in March gets you a spot and a call in June does not.
Junior group programmes are the best value in golf instruction by a distance. Kids learn faster in groups, and the cost per session is a fraction of private tuition.
Choosing an instructor
Ask two questions when you ring. How long is the lesson, and what happens between lessons. An instructor with a real answer to the second question is worth more than one with better credentials and no plan.
Ask about video too. Being shown what you actually do, rather than what you believe you do, is usually the moment something clicks.
Where to start
34 courses in the directory offer instruction. See the list and ring the pro shop. Most will happily talk through what they offer before you commit to anything.