By Roger Baty II
Turnagain Times Correspondent
As Girdwood grows and its citizens become more progressive, certain desires exist to move away from the municipality of Anchorage for support with basic infrastructure. With this thinking in mind, a charter school task force recently asked community members to attend a potluck, question and answer forum, and myth busting session of sorts concerning the implementation of a charter high school in town.
Parents and children alike came to support or question the idea on Oct. 3 in the Glacier City Hall. The task force included Sue Kennedy, Shannon O’Brien, Stephanie Flynn, and Rosie Fletcher.
A petition for support was there for attendees to sign, promoting no specific school district to handle the charter school. The Chugach School District, however, is the only district thus far to show interest in seeking community support.
Three representatives from the Chugach School District were on hand to present the option of a charter school as run through their district.
“We’re not a college prep, we’re a life prep,” said Carol Wilson, a life skills teacher in Chugach School District’s Anchorage office. “We’ll do everything we can to fit the needs of the individual students.”
This includes, she said, possibly partnering up with the Anchorage School District.
“We would just share services,” said Billijo Mills, a Chugach School District Voyage to Excellence coordinator. “And if it’s not necessary, there’s no money exchanged.”
Superintendent of the Anchorage School District, Carol Comeau, was contacted about the partnership between the Anchorage school district and the Chugach school district, but was unavailable for comment.
It would not just be Girdwood students sharing Anchorage’s facilities and programs, but vice versa as well.
“We have a great outdoor leadership program they can take part in,” said Mills.
Student athletes in Anchorage are likely to be drawn to the charter school given its vicinity to Alyeska Resort.
Olympic silver medalist snowboarder, Rosie Fletcher, a former student athlete from Girdwood, attended the community forum. Fletcher attended Girdwood schools from K-7, skipped eighth grade and went on to Dimond High School for two years. Thereafter, she was home schooled.
“Alaska is ranked forty-sixth in the nation for education,” said Fletcher. “That’s what happens when most the money goes to the administration.”
Fletcher’s personal and successful experience with home schooling, led her to push for a difference in the educational system, supporting the charter school implementation in Girdwood.
A charter school under the authority of Chugach School District is likely to give more focus on the individual students. Charter schools are exempt from using the local school district’s textbooks, curriculum, scheduling requirements and calendar. Chugach school district focuses on performance based learning rather than the traditional curriculum based methods.
“Our schools are schools without walls and are not time bound,” said Mills.
“Voyage to Excellence” is the Chugach district’s flagship program, where students can apply what they learn in the classroom to real life situations, gaining training in life skills, urban familiarization, personal, social and career development.
With charter school status, and a potential for high enrollment numbers, the school then faces the lottery system to decide on who may or may not be enrolled as a student. Based on this system, potential Girdwood candidates may not be able to enroll, which some saw as a potential risk.
“We’ll have to see if there’s a stipulation that allows the locals to gain access to the school,” said Bob Crumley, Chugach School District Superintendant.
Before enrollment can even be considered, an enrollment application process must be followed.
The Alaska Department of Education requires the planning committee for the charter school to first obtain approval from the Anchorage School Board by a simple majority vote. The Chugach School District looks to bypass this vote by the Anchorage School District by having their correspondence program implement the charter school.
The correspondence program is a home schooling program which allows students to learn at their own pace with their parents as their primary educators. It is an extension of a charter school in a way that teachers can still be accessed in the nearest charter school within the correspondence program’s district.
As a statewide correspondence program under the authority of the Chugach School District, it is not bound by Anchorage School District’s authority. It may, therefore, operate a charter school without the approval of the Anchorage School District. The facility, which would be the medium in which a correspondence program becomes a charter school, would be set up after approval is received by the state.
Alyeska Resort and the Associated General Contractors, the Chugach School District’s business partners, are offering seed money to begin the charter school application.
“The charter application has to go to our district school board, then to our state school board,” said Crumley. “If it is successful, we would submit an application to the state for a planning grant and implementation grant.”
However, state coffers are not filled with accessible funds this fiscal year, and the federal pass through funding for start up charter schools is not available in the fiscal year of 2008.
“Back in the 03’- 04’ fiscal year, we received a three year federal grant to help startup alternative education programs,” said Eric Fry, Information Officer with the Alaska Department of Education. “It was roughly five million.”
Because the number of charter school startups was not as great as the Alaska Department of Education anticipated, much of the original grant went unused. At the end of the 2005-2006 fiscal year, an extension was requested for access to the funds, which was granted.
In January of 2007, $2 million remained of the original grant. The U.S. Department of Education urged the state to apply for another extension for the access of these funds, rather than applying for another three year grant. When their extension was denied, and a request to reconsider the extension was denied, the state of Alaska was then without the excess money from the original three year grant and any money from a new grant.
Charter schools, though, are not bound by only state funding. They can seek grants from the federal government in just the same way as the state seeks grants for all its charter schools.
Should the state not succeed in receiving federal funding for startup charter school grants, said Crumley. “We’ll go directly to the Feds,” he said. “We’re in a holding pattern right now”
Future obstacles facing Alaska’s charter schools is the State Legislature, that earlier this year decided to cut the funding, which is divided among existing charter schools from $250,000 to $100,000.
As reported by Greg Skinner in a May issue of the Juneau Empire, A chief proponent of the cutback was Rep. Mike Chenault, co-chairman of the House Finance Committee and the conference committee. He objected to the small number of students in some charter schools and said that small charter schools were being subsidized by the state, and his goal with the budget cut was to “force them to get their enrollments up.”
If received, state funding for the startup costs of the school would total 80 percent of the necessary costs. The 20 percent not provided is based on the annual cost to maintain the school’s facilities. Because the correspondence program has no facility in Girdwood, it would not technically need that particular area of funding, until the facility is built, which establishes the charter school.
Once established, RIM Architects are ready with a preliminary design of the school, however, a contractor to build the facility has yet to be established. As for the location of the school, purchasing municipal land may be an option; although it is very preliminary in discussions at this point. The property is managed by the Heritage Land Bank and located behind the fire department next to the softball field.
Girdwood community members are now asked to let the task force or Chugach School District know what they think about the implementation of a charter school. Community members can contact task force member Sue Kennedy through e-mail at jskenn@alaska.net.
“We’re ready to start our program, we’re ready to go,” said Mills. “We’re just waiting to hear from you, the Girdwood community members.”