Education

Longtime Juneau School District board member and board president Deedie Sorensen says she is no longer planning to run for reelection. She’s been known as a longstanding advocate and voice for teachers during her six-year tenure.

Sorensen says she will finish out her current term but plans to step down after this October’s municipal election for personal reasons. Earlier this year, Sorensen told KTOO she did plan to run for reelection.

“I’ve given a lot of years to public education in Juneau, and it’s been extremely stressful and I would actually like to retire,” she said. 

Sorensen is 74 years old and a retired elementary school teacher who taught in Juneau for more than 35 years. She holds a Master’s Degree in Early Childhood Education. During her career, she was an active member of the Juneau Education Association and served as a staff member on many district committees. 

Juneau voters first elected Sorensen to the board in 2019. She was then reelected for a second term in 2022. While on the board, she helped the district navigate the COVID-19 pandemic and the consolidation of Juneau’s high schools and middle schools. 

Sorensen and fellow board member Emil Mackey were the subjects of a recall attempt in last year’s election. The effort was led by a group of residents who wanted to remove them in part due to their votes in favor of the consolidation. But election results showed that most voters were against removing the pair and both held their seats. 

“I really appreciate the community support last year,” she said. “That was absolutely one of the highlights of the whole thing was the community support during the recall.”

Sorensen said she stands by the decisions the board made during the pandemic and the consolidation process. She said a lot of the difficult issues the school board faces could be solved if the state and federal government adequately funded districts. She described the current state of public education in Alaska as walking on the edge of a cliff that’s eroding under your feet.  

“I feel like the last seven years have been, at the state level, have been an assault on public education,” she said. 

She said state and federal moves to shrink government funding for education undermine the basis for a well-informed public.

Sorensen’s is one of two school board seats that will be open this election. There’s also an opportunity to serve a partial term following former school board member Will Muldoon’s abrupt resignation this spring. 

As of Thursday afternoon, the city clerk’s office has not certified any candidates for those seats. The deadline to file for a seat in this election is Monday, July 28, at 4:30 p.m.

Updated correction: Emil Mackey no longer plans to run for school board.  

A coalition of schools and advocacy groups, including the Anchorage School District, is suing the Trump administration over its decision to withhold some $6.8 billion in federal education funds approved by Congress.

“When longstanding commitments are withheld without warning, it creates instability across our schools and directly impacts the students who depend on these programs the most,” Anchorage School District spokesperson Corey Allen Young said in an emailed statement.

The Trump administration’s Office of Management and Budget has said it’s withholding the funds pending a review. OMB and the Education Department did not respond to emails seeking comment.

The plaintiffs, which also include the Fairbanks North Star Borough and the Kuspuk School District in Western Alaska, along with school districts and teachers’ unions across the country, say the funding freeze violates federal law and the constitutional separation of powers.

“The Department provided no legal authority or timetable for its review, nor did it indicate what it was reviewing given that the statutes leave no discretion in distributing the funds,” the plaintiffs said in their complaint.

The funding approved by Congress is meant to support teacher training, migrant education, English language learning, and academic enrichment. Alaska schools received $47 million for those programs in the last fiscal year, according to the top Democrat on the U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee.

In an interview, Kuspuk School District Superintendent Madeline Aguillard said her district relies heavily on federal funds. She learned June 30 that more than $180,000 in federal funding for her district was on hold.

Aguillard had already signed contracts to send students to remote areas for a summer program studying salmon populations when the news of the freeze came down, she said. Now, she’s not sure how she’ll fill the gap.

“Some of these programs are honestly the cornerstone of what we offer, what we can offer, and what we have historically offered, and now we’re talking about literally removing those cornerstones,” Aguillard said.

Anchorage has seen nearly $12 million frozen, according to the lawsuit. Young, the district spokesperson, said the freeze had caused “significant disruption to our core mission of educating all students for success in life.” The frozen funds, bolstered early literacy programs, teacher training and mental health services and supported students whose families work in logging, agriculture and fishing, he said.

Brianna Gray, executive director of student support services with Fairbanks’ school district, said the freeze of funding intended for teacher training, academic enrichment and student support would hurt students throughout the district. The Fairbanks North Star Borough School District saw $2.5 million in federal funding frozen, according to the lawsuit.

“Our teams have had to pivot and adjust programming without this dedicated funding,” she said in a statement. “There is now a clear risk for staffing impacts and program cuts.”

The plaintiffs are asking a Rhode Island federal judge to order the Trump administration to distribute the funding.

Ten Republican senators, including Sen. Lisa Murkowski, sent a letter to the administration July 16 urging it to release the money. The Trump administration said it would unfreeze some of the funds meant for after-school programs, but Gray said her district was still waiting for the money to arrive.

Listen here:

The Alaska Department of Education and Early Development is appealing a federal decision that could cost the state $80 million – and potentially undermine equitable funding among Alaska schools. 

Federal impact aid is at the center of a dispute between the state and the federal government. It’s money that makes up for lost revenue from land that can’t be taxed, like federal, military or Alaska Native-owned land.

The state can normally use a portion of that money as part of its contribution to school districts – as long as it can prove it’s funding education equitably. That’s done through a disparity test.

The state failed that test earlier this year because the U.S. Department of Education rejected the state’s attempt to exclude funding that districts set aside for transportation from the test calculations. That means the state can’t use $80 million in federal impact aid to offset part of its obligation to school districts.

But it’s appealing that decision. In its appeal, the state argues that the federal department was wrong to count transportation funding in its test calculations. The state also asked to retake the test if the appeal fails.

Bonnie Graham, one of the attorneys representing DEED in the appeal, said in an email that it’s difficult to tell how long the case will take this early in the process, and could not comment on “potential outcomes of the pending appeal at this point.”

The federal department said in an email it will review information from the state and hopes to resolve the issue.

Financially, there are a few ways the appeal could play out. The simplest is if the appeal is successful. In that case, the state could continue to use federal dollars as part of its contribution to school districts.

But if the appeal fails, things get more complicated. Districts that qualify for impact aid would still receive that money on top of what they get from the state. And the state would need to make up for an $80 million gap in its funding. 

Alexei Painter is the director of the state’s Legislative Finance Division. Part of his role is to understand how the decision would affect the state’s budget. 

“If we fail the test under the Legislature’s budget, the state costs would go up by $80 million and then those districts would also get that $80 million,” he said. “So essentially districts as a whole would get about $80 million more.”

But some individual districts would get less, he said. 

Painter said that’s because the Legislature sets aside an open-ended amount of money for education funding. It’s basically however much is needed to meet the state’s statutory obligation to districts. He says in this case, districts get whatever the state owes them, plus the federal funds.

But Gov. Mike Dunleavy vetoed more than $50 million in education funding earlier this summer. If state legislators uphold the veto, Painter says that changes education funding from something open-ended to a fixed amount of money. The state would still need to make up the $80 million dollars, but it would have to do so by cutting education funding across the board.

“There’s only a fixed pot of money,” Painter said. “Raising the amount the state owes by $80 million means that all districts will essentially see their amount of aid reduce.”

The finance division estimates the state would have to reduce funding equal to an additional $319 cut to the state’s per-student allocation. That, along with the governor’s veto, would leave districts with only a $181 increase to the base student allocation this fiscal year.

That doesn’t mean that all districts would lose money. The division’s estimates show some districts, like the Fairbanks North Star Borough School District and Bering Strait School District, would receive enough federal impact aid that they receive more money overall – up to millions of dollars more.

Other districts like Anchorage and Kodiak would receive some impact aid, but it isn’t enough to offset the reduced state funding.

And for the 15 districts that don’t receive any impact aid, it would mean less state funding with no federal funds to fall back on. The Juneau School District is one of those districts. It could lose more than $2.5 million without any federal funding to make up for the loss. 

Juneau School District Superintendent Frank Hauser said it’s hard to figure out how things will shape up.

“It’s so difficult to even try to speculate as we’re going through and trying to figure out what could happen, because none of these situations are good for the students,” he said.

Hauser said he’s more concerned about other funding uncertainties that have cropped up in recent months. On top of Dunleavy’s education funding veto, DEED is proposing a regulation change that would further limit local contributions from municipalities to school districts.

On the federal side, the U.S Department of Education blocked millions in grants for migrant education, English language learners and more to the state.

Hauser says the district could lose more than $8 million from those actions.

The appeal process still has to play out. And the state has been successful in a similar appeal before – it successfully appealed a failed test in 2022. 

But at that time, Painter said the state didn’t find out until the end of the fiscal year. He said a similar timeline and a failed result could make things difficult for the state and districts. For example, districts that would receive more money may not have enough time to spend it, and may have more money in savings than state law allows.

In the meantime, Painter said the state is distributing funds to school districts as if it hasn’t failed the test.

Correction: This story has been updated to reflect that school districts will potentially be impacted by a failed appeal, not states.

A record 30 students have started their medical education this month in a special multistate collaborative program, the University of Alaska Anchorage and University of Washington announced.

The 30 students this month entered the WWAMI program, named after the first letters of the states that participate through universities: Washington, Wyoming, Alaska, Montana and Idaho. The program allows students to begin their medical education at universities in their home states — at UAA, in the case of Alaska — and complete their work toward medical degrees at the University of Washington School of Medicine in Seattle.

The WWAMI program offers Alaska’s only in-state education toward a medical degree. There is no medical school in Alaska. Students in the program typically spend their first 18 months taking classes and doing training work at UAA before moving onto studies at University of Washington. There are other options, including an option to complete the entire program in Alaska.

The milestone of 30 Alaska students starting their WWAMI education marks a turnaround in fortunes for the program.

In 2019, Gov. Mike Dunleavy proposed entirely eliminating state funding for the Alaska portion of the WWAMI partnership. At the time, he characterized WWAMI as a waste of state money.

Three years later, Dunleavy took the opposite position. He proposed expanding WWAMI funding so that the program could expand from 20 students from each cohort year, which was the  enrollment at the time, to 30 per cohort year.

The Legislature in 2023 approved a funding increase that allowed 25 students to start the WWAMI program last year and 30 this year.

The WWAMI program’s history dates back to 1971, when nine students enrolled in preliminary courses at the University of Alaska Fairbanks arranged in partnership with the University of Washington. They then completed their education in Seattle. Montana and Idaho entered the program in 1972, and Wyoming entered it in 1996, according to a history compiled by UAA. Alaska WWAMI relocated from UAF to UAA in 1989.

This article has been updated to include that there is an option to complete the program inside Alaska. 

Federal funds for adult education services were among those blocked by the Trump administration on July 1, causing immediate cuts to Alaska adult education and workforce development programs and staff layoffs.

The U.S. Department of Education has withheld more than $6 billion in congressionally approved grants for education, including over $629 million for adult education basic grants, and more than $85 million in adult integrated English literacy and civics education grants. The administration has said that it’s withholding the federal funding to review the grant programs to ensure they align with the Republican president’s priorities.

Adult education can range from classes that help adults learn basic literacy to programs that assist students in gaining certificates equivalent to high school diplomas, and can teach skills that are essential to performing certain jobs.

Alaska had over $1.1 million allocated as part of an adult education basic grant, according to the Alaska Department of Labor and Workforce Development, which administers the grants. A department spokesperson said on Tuesday the grant amounts for English literacy and civics education this year were not available, but the state received more than $99,600 last year.

The withheld funds means immediate cuts to services for Alaska adult learners and staff layoffs, according to grant recipients.

“We were definitely blindsided,” said Lucie Magrath, executive director of the Literacy Council of Alaska, a Fairbanks-based nonprofit that provides adult education programs, including adult literacy, English language learning, civics and General Educational Development, or GED, preparation classes.

Magrath said an estimated $180,000 in federal funding, or over half of their budget, was impounded, causing immediate cuts to services and staff layoffs. While the organization did not identify the number of layoffs in an interview last week, the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner has since reported that there were five layoffs.

“So we are having to make some pretty drastic decisions with staffing and programming,” she said in a phone interview on Thursday. “We likely will not be able to serve nearly as many people this year, and we’re making staffing cuts right now.”

The organization provides in-person and virtual instruction and mentoring to adult learners in Fairbanks, as well as in villages in the Interior and Western Alaska, stretching from the Yukon Flats to the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta.

They also have a workforce development program, the Pathways Program, serving youths and young adults ages 16 to 24, and run the used bookstore Forget-Me-Not Books in Fairbanks, which provides revenues for its programs, jobs training and employment.

Shelby Cooke is the assistant executive director of the Literacy Council of Alaska, and said it’s difficult to fill such a large funding gap, especially on such short notice, and Alaskans will be impacted.

“The real detriment is to our students and Alaskans who need that GED credential to go to work, or maybe they’re a super-skilled person in their native tongue, but they need enough English to be able to navigate a job interview,” she said. “Those are the folks that are suffering, and in turn, our economy suffers too.”

Magrath said some programs will be suspended immediately. It’s possible that these suspensions will be temporary, as her organization figures out its next steps. “We’re looking at restructuring some of our programs just to be able to use the resources that we have to the maximum impact for our community and our students,” she said. “So we have a lot to figure out right now.”

Southeast Regional Resource Center is a nonprofit educational services agency that provides a variety of services statewide, including adult education, English language learning and workforce development programs. In addition, SERRC provides educational and business services to school districts, including special education programs, human resources and grant administration.

“We do have some state funds, and so we’ve had to modify our budget just off what we know we have for funding — for state funds — and we are looking at having to reduce our staffing,” said Chris Reitan, its executive director, in a phone interview Thursday. He said the organization is looking at cutting at least two staff positions and a few part-time positions. “So we are concerned about the ability to have the same level of impact.”

Reitan said the federal funding freeze withheld over $86,600 for adult education programs in Southeast Alaska, and over $64,000 in the Aleutians region.

He said SERRC’s program served 112 students last year in the areas of GED support, English language learning and workforce development across the state.

“Number one, adult education provides a kind of a lifeline for Alaskans seeking to improve their lives, and it also helps strengthen our state’s workforce,” he said, and will have an immediate impact on adult learners, “which then could immediately impact their ability in regards to getting good-paying jobs, their ability to provide for their families, their ability to contribute to their local communities.”

He added: “I see this as being a significant impact across the state, in regards to our citizens being able to have the opportunity to better themselves.”

SERRC and the Literacy Council of Alaska are two of 14 adult education programs across the state with grant funding administered by the Alaska Department of Labor and Workforce Development. A department spokesperson, Adam Weinert, said by email that the department has continued to award available state matching funds for the programs, totaling more than $1.9 million.

“Sub-grantees were informed that we were moving forward at this time with state funding only,”  Weinert said of the programs. “Once federal funding is released, we will move forward with a budget modification to provide for the federal funding.”

The full impact of how the freeze will affect some programs in the long term remains unclear.

The University of Alaska system has several adult education programs, funded in part by federal funds, as well as state and local funding. Jonathan Taylor, the university’s director of communications, said by email Monday that “discussions are ongoing” around funding but those programs are scheduled to continue.

Taylor said at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, the Bristol Bay Adult Education program will start up in August with funding from Bristol Bay Economic Development Corp.

Within the University of Alaska Anchorage, there are adult education programs at Kodiak College, serving the Kodiak Island Borough; Kenai Peninsula College, serving the Soldotna, Homer and Seward regions; and Prince William Sound College, serving the Valdez, Cordova and Copper Basin regions.

“We have received assurances that all three will receive some sort of funding this year,” Taylor said. “To our knowledge, the state will initiate these awards using either state funding or federal funding it has access to. If additional Federal Funds become available, the state will amend the agreements to make up to the original intended funding amount. Currently, this is an active endeavor and ongoing discussion with the state.”

The Juneau School District Board of Education accepted a $145,000 grant from a Juneau philanthropic foundation Monday.

The money from the Juneau Community Foundation will maintain a counselor position at Juneau-Douglas High School: Yadaa.at Kalé for another year and go toward professional development for counselors.

The grant money is the last piece in the funding puzzle that allows the district to keep counseling services at the same level as last year at the middle and high school. 

Grant funding for three positions ended earlier this year. The board originally budgeted to retain two of them. The new grant takes care of the last position.

This is the third position the board added this month as the district gears up for the next school year that starts Aug. 15.

The district approved adding a librarian and administrative assistant to handle homeschool registration last week after receiving more state funding than it originally anticipated.

But funding remains uncertain on a state and federal level. 

The federal government has blocked more than $400,000 the district planned on using for English language learners, professional development and enrichment education.

The district also estimates a proposed state regulation change from the Alaska Department of Education and Early Development could cost it at least $8 million in local funding and services.