Jamie Diep

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A controversial higher education compact from the Trump administration has sparked a petition from several University of Alaska unions, who say they’re worried about political overreach stifling academic freedom. 

Several University of Alaska staff and community members testified against the Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education on Monday, ahead of the UA Board of Regents meeting later this week. A petition from unions representing faculty, graduate workers and university staff opposing the compact also received 659 signatures.

Jill Dumesnil is a mathematics professor for University of Alaska Southeast and the president of the faculty union United Academics AAUP/AFT. She said in an interview that the compact ties federal funding to a political agenda.

“It restricts the freedom to teach, research and learn,” she said. “It undermines institutional autonomy and self governance, and it ties benefits, research benefits, to factors other than scientific merit.”

The compact lays out requirements for universities to receive federal funding. Part of the compact instructs universities “to seek such a broad spectrum of viewpoints not just in the university as a whole, but within every field, department, school, and teaching unit.” It also includes a 5-year tuition freeze and limits how many international students a university can admit.

The U.S Department of Education initially sent the compact to nine universities, and most of them rejected it. In a Truth Social post last month, Trump said any higher education institution in the country could sign on to it.

Even though the UA Board of Regents has not made any move to accept the compact so far, Dumesnil said they want to make their voices heard on the issue. In February, the board suddenly approved a motion to scrub mentions of diversity, equity and inclusion in a process that didn’t give the public an opportunity to comment. 

“We didn’t want that to happen again. So that’s why we, we went ahead and told them what we, what we thought,” she said. “And you know, that’s all we can do.”

Kate Quick works for United Academics at the university, but testified on Monday as an individual. She says the February motion had a “chilling effect” on people in the university and community.

“When the compact came out, people started to say, ‘Oh, just wait. The board will be the first to sign,’” Quick said. “And so that’s why this petition went around, and that’s why people are calling tonight to ask you not to sign.”

But Jonathon Taylor, the director of public affairs for the university, says the motion from February is different from the compact because it was based on a direct communication from the federal Department of Education.

“If there’s a question as to whether or not the university needs to take action on particular direction or guidance changes or policy changes that have been made, we need to see those official communications to the university, because that’s what the standard practice is,” Taylor said.

Taylor said the agenda for this week’s meeting doesn’t include discussion or action items on the compact. The board is scheduled to meet on Thursday and Friday in Anchorage.

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As the federal government shutdown stretches into its second month, federal workers remain furloughed. Now, SNAP benefits are also likely delayed for November. Two judges on Friday ordered the Trump administration to release emergency funds for SNAP, or food stamps, but it’s unclear if the money will come through.

Given that uncertainty, the Juneau School District is working to make sure students stay fed. Elizabeth Seitz is the district’s food service supervisor. She said the district is reaching out to families to apply for free and reduced-price school meals.

“We want to make sure that the Juneau School District students have nutritious and balanced meals so that they can focus and learn and thrive,” she said.

Qualifying students will be able to receive those benefits for the rest of the school year. Seitz says there are paper applications available at schools. Families can also apply online at School Café, which can be reached on the district’s website.

“Families who have never done an online application, they would just need their student’s ID number to establish an account to set that up,” Seitz said.

Seitz said her office can process applications as soon as they receive them, and qualifying students can receive the benefits as soon as the same day. SNAP recipients also automatically qualify for free and reduced lunch, which Seitz says they will continue to receive regardless of the federal delays to SNAP benefits. 

The district will continue to offer universal free breakfast to all students. The Juneau School Board Vice President Elizabeth Siddon brought up offering universal free lunch in November, but the school board tabled that action after the district estimated it would cost more than $200,000.

Individual schools are also stepping up to keep students fed.

On a Thursday evening, families and teachers at Juneau’s Tlingit Culture Language and Literacy program danced and sang to Goosú Wa.é as Naakil.aan Hans Chester, the school’s biliteracy specialist, called out different clan names. When families heard their father’s clan called out, they danced up to a blanket draped over a table and placed cash donations on it. 

Chester said a dance group from the Lukaax.ádi Clan used the song in the 1960s as a way to raise money.

“Goosú Wa.é is a Lukaax.ádi song,” he said. “It was brought down to the coast by a man named Aak’é Éesh. He was one of their ancestors, and he would go up into the Interior to trade, and one of the things that he would trade for are songs. And he brought a lot of different songs down to the coast.”

The event was meant to be a family night, but at the last minute, the teachers added a fundraiser to pay for snacks for all students during the school day. Chester said the Central Council of the Tlingit & Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska typically pays for snacks.

But the money didn’t come through and the school started pulling funds from its activities budget to pay for snacks. Chester said he feels grateful to families for stepping up and making sure students are fed during the day.

“It’ll help alleviate some of the pressure we as staff feel, because it is just a basic need that we’re trying to meet,” he said. 

He said the school approaches life with humor and finds the opportunities to laugh even when things are challenging.

“The strength that we have, that we’re taught and that we foster, I think, really shines in times like this,” he said.

TCLL isn’t the only school stepping up to support students. Deborah Cordero is the community schools coordinator for Kax̲dig̲oowu Héen Elementary. She says the school receives a grant that allows them to provide more resources to families, like getting students clothes or connecting them to food pantries. 

“When that comes, like, I’m able to help transport people or take them to food banks and things like that. So as the need arises, we do have some things in place that we can do for families.”

David Villarreal is a counselor at Kax̲dig̲oowu Héen. He says the school is one of several in the district that receive weekend food bags from Gastineau Human Services. Students who are signed up can get bags of food they can eat through the weekend. Families can sign up on the school’s website.

As a counselor, Villarreal said he’s being proactive in reaching out to make sure families are getting the resources they need. But he says it’s not just about making sure children’s physical needs are met.

“I’m kind of, like, expecting, you know, just more emotional strain from students in the coming weeks as this sort of plays out, because we don’t know what’s going to really happen,” he said.

He said he’s keeping his classroom open for students to come in and process their emotions as needed.

Both Kax̲dig̲oowu Héen and Thunder Mountain Middle School are holding food drives beginning on Nov. 3, and counselors at the schools are ready to help students who need it.

Families in need of assistance with free and reduced lunch applications can contact the Food Services office by calling 907-7969-5812 or emailing food.services@juneauschools.org.

The Juneau school board swore in three members and honored two outgoing members at a meeting Tuesday. 

In this fall’s municipal election, Steve Whitney was reelected to the board after being appointed to fill a seat vacated earlier this year. Jenny Thomas and Melissa Cullum were elected to the board for the first time.

The board honored outgoing members Emil Mackey and Deedie Sorensen. Mackey initially joined the board in 2015. In his outgoing remarks, he said he hopes to see an end to what he called an “attack on our public servants” nationwide. 

Sorensen worked as a teacher for the district for more than 35 years and was elected to the board in 2019. She ran unsuccessfully as a write-in candidate this fall.

Both Sorensen and Mackey survived a failed recall effort last year following the district’s school consolidation last year. Mackey commended Sorensen for attending meetings while undergoing cancer treatment during that time.

“She could have died during that process, and she did not miss a single meeting,” he said. “She would have chemo in the morning, and she would be on the Zoom call later that night.”

Sorensen thanked the public and her colleagues before leaving and said she plans to enjoy some time off.

“I got my all clear from my oncologist last week, and so, you know, so for the knowable future, things are looking really good,” she said.

Once the new members were sworn, the board immediately got to work on district business, including formally accepting Superintendent Frank Hauser’s resignation and listening to more than an hour of public comment about union contracts.

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The University of Alaska Anchorage kicked off its new school psychology masters program this fall to address a shortage in school psychologists.

But the program has so far failed to get approval from the state Board of Education over concerns about social justice advocacy. That could make it harder for students to get jobs after they graduate. 

Alaska has very few local school psychologists. They are trained to evaluate students to see if they qualify for special education services, and provide mental health support.

But very few work directly for school districts. To fill the gap, UAA professor Hattie Harvey said districts contract with school psychologists instead.

“So that often looks like someone from Lower 48 coming up two to three times a year for special education testing, which is a very small percentage of the capacity of the role of a school psychologist, they could provide,” Harvey said.

Alaska is one of two states that didn’t have an in-state school psychology program. Harvey spearheaded efforts to launch the state’s first program at UAA.

The goal is to train school psychologists locally, in a state where they currently serve more than three times the national recommended average of students. In the 2023-2024 school year, the ratio of school psychologists to students in Alaska was 1 to 1,576. The national standard is 1 to 500.

But the first cohort of students might struggle to find work immediately after graduating because of licensing requirements.

Harvey said state law requires school psychologists to get their license to work in the state in a couple ways.  

“They can graduate from a NASP-accredited program, which is the National Association of School Psychologists,” she said. “It’s the one accrediting and the only accrediting body for school psychology programs across the nation. And then the second way is graduating from a state-approved program.”

Harvey said the university is in the accreditation process. The earliest they can achieve accreditation is in 2029, which is a year after the current cohort is expected to graduate.

The state Board of Education makes the decision on approving the program, in order for students to be able to get licensed through the state. But the board voted down the approval earlier this month in a split vote and asked the university to make changes based on their feedback.

Students still have an option to apply for a national certification after graduating that would allow them to get licensed in the state. But Harvey said the process is much longer than the other two pathways. That could mean students would have to wait a year after graduating before being hired by a district.

Board member Kathryn McCollum was one of the members who voted against approval. She said at the meeting she was concerned about an article from a sample syllabus that focused on social justice, as well as the structure of the program.

“I really do know that we need school psychologists, and I do appreciate the work that they do in the schools,” McCollum said. “I don’t want a program that is designed to create, basically activists.”

She said she was concerned the program could become overly political or divisive. 

Sally Stockhausen chairs the board and voted in favor of the program. She’s the special education director for the Ketchikan Gateway Borough School District and said school psychologists need to learn about social justice as part of their education.

“I would much rather us educate and have graduates leave who know what’s out there, rather than, than, than remove all exposure to, to these thoughts.”

Social justice and advocacy is a part of a framework for practicing school psychology as laid out by NASP. Emily Wendling is a school psychologist for the Anchorage School District and the state’s delegate for NASP.

She said social justice plays a big role in her daily work, which is largely about supporting student mental health and making sure they have equitable access to education.

“A part of that is making sure that we are understanding social justice and helping to prevent barriers or address barriers to students’ education and create equitable opportunities for all of our students.”

Ella MacRae moved to Alaska last summer and is enrolled in the new program. She called the program “life-changing” and hopes to stay in the state after graduating. She said accredited programs from outside the state touch on these topics, and hiring school psychologists from those programs means they will also be learning about topics of social justice.

“Why are we stopping our school psychs here, or trying to stop them from touching on those themes, especially when it’s so important that we have this program and include other things that out-of-state programs might not touch on, like, have an emphasis on rural communities,” MacRae said.

Megan Beattie is also a student in the program and works as a special education teacher for the Fairbanks North Star Borough School District. Beattie said the program has already helped her work as a teacher, where she spends her day advocating for her students.

“I advocate for my students all day, every day, whether it’s working with my co-teachers and trying to get accommodations in place for my students that have special education needs, or if it’s working with our counseling department to make sure that my kids’ mental health needs are met,” she said. “Sometimes it’s even literally just getting them fed.”

 She said it’s been frustrating to see the board vote down the program.

“Yes, we’re exposed to different ideologies, we’re exposed to different research methods, but ultimately, our job is to advocate for our students and meet their best needs,” she said. “And so having one article that came up as kind of a primary reason for not approving the program as a whole is really frustrating.”

Beattie said she’s concerned about the lack of state approval and the idea of not being able to work as a school psychologist right after graduating. The program has a full-time internship that means students like her won’t be able to work their normal jobs for a school year. And they might not be able to get their old jobs back if they need to go through a longer certification process.

Beattie said she hopes the board will approve the program at its next meeting. She said she wants to stay in the state to continue to support students.

“This is home, and Alaska can sometimes get the short end of the stick on resources and everything anyways,” she said. “So to be able to give back to the state that has raised me and given me the opportunities that I have had in life is really important for me.”

The state board is expected to meet again in December.

The Juneau school board will have two new board members and one returning member following the release of final election results Tuesday.

Steve Whitney and Melissa Cullum won three-year terms, and Jenny Thomas will serve a two-year term on the board.

The board appointed Whitney to fill a seat after Will Muldoon resigned earlier this year. He previously served on the board from 2016 to 2019. Whitney did not respond to a request for comment Wednesday.

Cullum is a homeschool parent and a former teacher. She said she’s looking forward to working with other board members.

“We’re in a good spot of transition, and I’m really kind of excited about moving us towards a more positive feeling or climate in our district,” she said.

Jenny Thomas will serve the remaining two years of Muldoon’s term. She said she’s excited to bring community engagement and new ideas to the board.

“Hoping to make the meetings a little less bureaucratic where it’s just reading reports and getting a little bit more into the like, the meat and potatoes of actually what’s going on,” she said.

Thomas was one of the leaders of an unsuccessful recall campaign against board members Emil Mackey and Deedie Sorenson after the school board closed and consolidated schools last year to fill a $9.7 million deficit. 

Sorenson filed to run as a write-in candidate two weeks before Election Day. The retired educator and current school board president said she’ll find other things to keep herself busy after she steps down.

“I’ve always been, you know, an advocate for public education. So, I mean, I don’t think that I’m going to take that hat off,” she said.

Jeremy “JJJ” Johnson also was not elected. He said in a text message that he’s proud to have received close to 20% of the vote, but he’s disappointed by the results of the ballot propositions and now plans to support his wife’s desire to leave Juneau.

“I can’t justify keeping her and the children here in a community that is steering towards some of the most challenging experiences a school system can face, just because I’m committed to the people I worked with, went to school with, and enjoyed casual time with,” he wrote.

Board members will be sworn in at the next school board meeting on Tuesday.

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The Alaska Office of Children’s Services has struggled with staffing for years, from high vacancies and turnover to high caseloads. And data shows caseworker demographics also don’t line up with the state’s, or the system’s children.

According to the 2023 progress report on the state’s child welfare system, 8.7% of caseworkers are Alaska Native or American Indian, and more than 71.9% are white. As for supervisors, all but 2 of the agency’s 13 supervisors are white. The agency is turning to training and partnering with tribes to address the gap.

Indigenous children have been overrepresented in Alaska’s child welfare system for years. State population estimates from last year show that 23.8% people under the age of 18 are Alaska Native or American Indian. But data from the Office of Children’s Services shows they consistently make up around two-thirds of the children who are in out-of-home care such as a foster home. It’s been as high as 69% in the past.

Mary Johnson is the senior director of family services at the Central Council of the Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska, and worked as a caseworker for a tribal organization earlier in her career. She said the racial disparity concerns her.

“How do we connect with this, these 69% of our families?” she said. “If they are from one population, it would make sense that we would want to identify people to work with the population who are like them.”

Kate Paskievitch is a public information officer with the Alaska Department of Family and Community Services, which runs OCS. In an email, she wrote that “OCS does not view this as a ‘concern’ in the sense of a problem to be fixed, but it does guide our efforts to provide culturally responsive care.”

She wrote that care includes partnering with local tribes in the state on cases, prioritizing hiring local staff in the communities they serve, and providing ongoing training on cultural responsiveness.

Tlingit and Haida is one of the tribes that partners with the state on cases that apply to the Indian Child Welfare Act, or ICWA. That federal law lays out minimum requirements when taking on a case involving Indigenous children. The state must try to place children with their family members or in their local communities first.

Johnson herself is Yup’ik. She said it’s important to have tribal representation when working on these child welfare cases.

“It makes sense that if you’re not able to recruit and hire Alaska Native people, at least partner with tribes, at least have tribal partners be a part of the decision making process when making decisions about how our children and families are being cared for and treated,” she said.

Johnson said the tribe largely employs Alaska Native people in its family services office. She said it’s important to have Alaska Native people working on cases, either as a caseworker or as a tribal partner.

“I do think in the field of child welfare, when it’s something so serious and so personal, that the people making the decisions for the group of people that are involved really should have knowledge on how this other group exists in this world, right, and how we parent,” she said.

Trevor Storrs is the president of Alaska Children’s Trust, a nonprofit that advocates and works toward ending child abuse and neglect in the state. He said hiring people whose racial demographics line up with the people they serve is important, but it’s hard to focus on that when the entire system is strained.

“They’re doing really important work, and their hearts are out to protect kids, but they’re also challenged,” he said. “There have been audits. They have high caseloads. They can’t keep staff. There’s just all these challenges.”

Storrs said training on cultural responsiveness is part of social work programs, which is why he said it’s important for the state to hire credentialed workers. That also isn’t always happening.

An audit performed this year on OCS shows many people hired do not have a degree in social work. The state even hired case workers with only a high school diploma.

Storrs said the state should be looking for ways to improve the system as a whole. He said he wants to see a focus on supporting children and families and preventing the problems that lead to OCS intervening.

“It’s less kids that are not going to school, less kids and families addicted to substances, and for us and for OCS, it would be less cases of child abuse and neglect,” he said.

Research from Casey Family Programs shows some children benefit from the system, but they often leave state custody with lasting negative effects on their education, mental health and employment.

A change to the system might be on the horizon. A federal class action lawsuit against the state aiming to reform the system is awaiting a judge’s decision.