Juneau Schools

Voters will be asked this fall whether Juneau’s School Board President Deedie Sorenson and Vice President Emil Mackey should stay in their seats on the board or get ousted from them. 

On Thursday, Juneau’s clerk’s office announced that a local effort to recall the pair had gathered enough signatures to get the two questions onto the Oct. 1 ballot — nearly 2,400 signatures each. 

Charles VanKirk, one of the leaders of the recall effort, called it an important step toward accountability.

“We want to hold our elected officials responsible and have them be accountable, so hopefully, there will be answers given rather than the public just being ignored,” he said. 

The group argues that both Sorensen and Mackey failed to do their duty as board members when the district faced a multimillion dollar deficit earlier this year. 

This spring, the school board voted to address that deficit by closing some schools, consolidating grades and reducing staff. 

But VanKirk said those decisions weren’t in the best interest of the students or staff and weren’t what the public wanted.  

“We feel hopeful that the recall will be successful, and that the opportunity exists for different people to be on the school board,” he said. 

Sorensen and Mackey are both set to serve their terms through 2025, and they are the only board members eligible to be recalled from the board.

In response to the certification, Mackey said he’s deeply concerned about what message this will give to people who want to run for a seat on the board in this and future elections. He said the effort has been riddled with misinformation from the start. 

“The damage that this is doing by just misinforming people on its face is extremely counterproductive to the welfare of the school district,” he said. 

He said he thinks the root issue behind the recall effort is the board’s decision to close Thunder Mountain High School. He argues it has little to do with him and Sorensen as individual board members. 

“In my opinion, every person that signed that affidavit either was ignorant or willfully misleading the public as to the facts of what led to the budgetary decisions,” he said. “They use the budget as an excuse to get it on the ballot. But it’s always been about Thunder Mountain.”

Sorensen said that, as a former teacher in Juneau, every board decision she makes is what she believes is best for student’s education. She said she stands by her budget decision, but thinks the recall effort is hardly about that. 

“I think that people are angry. A certain group of people are extremely angry about the closure of one of the high schools,” she said. “And with the recall, I think that there’s some attempt to assign blame.”

She and Mackey said they will continue to advocate for themselves as board members and the decisions they made. 

The next step is for the city clerk to transmit the certified petitions to the Assembly at its next meeting. There, the Assembly will need to pass a motion to include the questions on the ballot.

Last week, Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy signed this year’s state budget into law, including a one-time funding boost of about $175 million to school districts.

The Juneau School District gets a $5.2 million slice of that. But this money comes months after the Juneau Board of Education controversially voted to consolidate schools and reduce staff to offset a multi-million dollar deficit.

This additional state money won’t reverse the  plan for the upcoming school year, but the board now gets to decide what budget items could be added back.

During a meeting Friday, Juneau Superintendent Frank Hauser reminded the board that the money isn’t necessarily a reliable source beyond this coming school year. 

“The additional state funding would be one-time funding and not guaranteed for FY2026,” he said.  

Friday’s meeting was just the first of two on the topic. This Saturday, the board will meet again to make a final decision on which items will be added back for the coming school year.

Some of the things on the table include recovering several elementary and secondary staff positions, paraeducators, custodians, or HomeBRIDGE and IT staff.

Board Vice President Emil Mackey expressed support last week for ensuring the district had an adequate number of IT support staff. 

“We need responsive tech support for our HomeBRIDGE students, for our teachers, for our students,” he said. “Because anytime you cannot connect to the internet, no matter what you’re teaching, that is lost teaching time.”

Board President Deedie Sorensen said she thinks that ensuring that there is enough custodial and maintenance staff should be a priority. 

“While we focus on being able to have teachers to provide education, we sometimes forget about what it takes to keep the buildings open and operating and clean,” she said. 

The rankings the board made last week are still subject to change. The list for Saturday’s meeting includes more than a dozen different priorities that could be added back.

More than 300 seniors graduated from Juneau’s three high schools on Sunday. For Thunder Mountain’s graduates, the ceremony was especially bittersweet. 

There, 147 new graduates moved their tassels from right to left — signifying the end of their high school careers. 

The day was filled with celebration, but for some it also brought heartbreak. This was Thunder Mountain’s last graduating senior class before it becomes a middle school next year under the Juneau School District’s consolidation plan. 

The stands were overflowing as faculty, school board members and guest speaker Juneau Representative Andi Story commended the students. 

Valedictorian Lauren Stichert applauded her peers for navigating unprecedented events. The class started high school during the COVID-19 pandemic, and their last year took place amid a difficult district consolidation process brought on by budget issues.

“I would like to take this opportunity to sincerely thank and acknowledge every teacher, coach, counselor, administrator, janitor and librarian that has contributed to the growth and success of every student in this room today,” she said. “We have been made smarter, kinder and better because of our teachers and will continue to grow because of their influence.”

After the ceremony, graduate Elizabeth Djajalie said she was nervous but excited for what’s to come for herself, her peers and Thunder Mountain. 

“This is a super bittersweet moment — but definitely more sweet than anything else. Because I’m just so grateful, overwhelmed with gratitude really, for all the teachers and peers that are all here,” she said. “A lot of these faces I know I won’t see again for a long time, but I’m just so glad to have seen them passed through the halls these past four years.”

Across town, 130 students from Juneau-Douglas High School: Yadaa.at Kalé also graduated Sunday. The energy there was lighter — students smiled and waved to their parents, and one even did a backflip as they walked across the stage.

During her speech, Meadow Stanley said she feels a lot of pride to be a Crimson Bear graduate alongside the students in her class. 

“We have all struggled, and yet we have all made it to this day together. And for that, I will be forever grateful,” she said. 

Another student, Ryan Shattuck congratulated the class of 2024 for overcoming difficulties throughout their high school careers, including starting school virtually.  

“We became Crimson Bears without even walking through the door,” he said. “Instead of rushing to our classes like most freshmen do, we instead took our time to open our eyes, sit up in our bed, grab our computers, open our computers, and log into our Zoom classes. And then we went back to sleep.”

The small-but-mighty graduating class of 31 students from the Yaaḵoosgé Daakahídi alternative high school also received their diplomas on Sunday. Speakers at that ceremony said it was an accomplishment that took a lot of hard work and resilience for many of the students.  

Commencement speaker Kenyon Jordan thanked his teachers for all the support they gave to him throughout his time at the school. 

“We have only just scratched the surface of our own lives, and there are no limits to what we can accomplish,” he said. “If we believe in ourselves as our teachers believed in us, and we’re confident that we will get what we want.”

The district’s consolidation plan will move the alternative high school from the Marie Drake building downtown to the Dzantik’i Heeni Campus in Lemon Creek.

The Juneau School District’s consolidation plan for next fall means some students and parents will have to spend extra time traveling each day to get to school.

To accommodate that, the Juneau School Board voted on Tuesday to slightly change the start times for some grade levels. 

While all elementary school start times will remain the same next year, middle school and high school will shift to begin 15 minutes later. 

That means for all the high schoolers heading to Juneau-Douglas High School: Yadaa.at Kalé downtown next year, classes will start at 9:30 a.m. and end at 4 p.m. The middle schoolers headed to Thunder Mountain Middle School in the Mendenhall Valley will start at 8:45 a.m. and get out at 3:15 p.m.

And, despite the change, the district will still offer a bus shuttle service for students who live anywhere to go to the optional programs at the Dzantik’i Heeni Campus in Lemon Creek. Those programs include the Yaaḵoosgé Daakahídi alternative high school, Juneau Community Charter School and Montessori Borealis.

District officials say the benefit of the later start time means high school drivers will be on the road after the morning rush hour traffic, and it will give them more time to sleep in and find parking. 

A different start time option was also discussed by the board Tuesday night. It would have made elementary schools start earlier instead. But, members ultimately decided against it. Dan Debartolo, a former school board member and parent, testified in favor of more sleep for young students. 

“If you’ve ever had an elementary-age student, every drop of sleep in the morning can be precious and be the difference whether or not you’re getting your kid to school tardy, unexcused, or not,” he said. 

The district says new bus route schedules will be developed and posted on its website ahead of the new school year.

The Juneau Assembly unanimously approved the school district’s more than $85 million budget for next school year at a meeting Monday night. 

The move comes after months of turmoil and difficult decisions as the district faced a nearly $10 million deficit. The approved budget plan is funded via city, state and federal dollars. 

Superintendent Frank Hauser said it’s a relief to get to this point, but there’s still much work to be done. 

“We’ve got a budget in place now being able to move forward for (fiscal year) 25. And that’s just good to be able to say, ‘Okay, we’re focusing on, you know, the next steps,’” he said. 

The budget passed by the Juneau school board earlier this spring was built on the assumption that state education funding will not increase. Instead, it relies on cost-cutting measures like school consolidation and reducing the number of staff positions in the district.

Last month the Assembly approved giving $34 million in local funding to the district – the maximum amount allowed by state law. It also approved more than $3.5 million in additional funding for non-instructional programming.

The amount of state funding the district will receive is still up in the air. As this year’s legislative session nears an end, both the House and Senate have included $175 million in one-time funding for education in their proposed operating budgets. And Gov. Mike Dunleavy indicated potential support for the funding earlier this month. 

That potential boost in state funding could mean the district would be able to revise its budget to save more staff positions. The current plan will eliminate nearly 50 positions next year. The district has to send out layoff notices to teachers and staff by Wednesday. 

Hauser said it’s going to be a waiting game with the legislature and governor. 

“We’ll just have to wait and see. I mean, we just don’t know what the legislature is going to do. And if the governor is going to assign operating budget into law, and of course, if there’s gonna be any vetoes as part of that,” he said. 

Last year, Dunleavy vetoed half of a nearly identical increase in one-time education funding. 

He can do that because the state’s constitution allows the governor to veto or reduce budget line items after they’re approved by the legislature. Earlier this year, Dunleavy vetoed a larger bipartisan education bill that would have increased state funding for public schools on an ongoing basis.

The Juneau School District is hiring a familiar face to serve as its new chief financial officer. 

On Friday, the district announced Lisa Pearce would take over the role in July. She is a school finance consultant who previously worked as the Fairbanks North Star Borough School District’s chief financial officer.

Pearce played a critical role in the Juneau district finances this year. She was temporarily hired in December to take over after the district’s Director of Administrative Services Cassee Olin abruptly resigned. 

Within a short period, Pearce discovered the district was facing multimillion-dollar deficits for this year and next. Some of that was due in part to accounting errors.

With her help, the district was able to resolve those deficits — but not without difficulty. The district took out a loan of more than $4 million from the city to address this year’s budget deficit, and next year’s budget relies on school closures and a reduction in staff.

In a statement, Superintendent Frank Hauser applauded Pearce’s “skill set, commitment to transparency and forward-thinking approach.”

Pearce’s role replaces the district’s former director of administrative services position, so it won’t add more staff to the district. She will be in charge of preparing the district’s budget, fiscal plans and projections each year.