Kenai Peninsula school board members approved two charter school applications during a special meeting on Monday. One of those applications will open the peninsula’s first public school focused on Alaska Native culture.
The votes came after a month of meetings by the school board committee tasked with overseeing charter schools. This year, that group considered renewing an existing charter for Aurora Borealis Charter School in Kenai – and a proposal for a new charter school run by the Kenaitze Indian Tribe.
“Long ago, the Dena’ina felt invisible,” she said. “And today the Yaghanen program … we’re able to teach ourselves who we are, to give that confidence to our children, to give them the knowledge of who they are, who they represent and be able to let them know that they represent their community, but also their family.”
That’s Donita Slawson. She manages the tribe’s Yaghanen Language and Culture program. She says she’s excited for her one-year-old granddaughter to eventually attend Tułen and learn her language, culture and history.
If the Kenaitze Indian Tribe’s Tułen Charter School opens next school year, it will be the district’s first to center on Dena’ina culture and traditions. The school will serve about 48 kindergarten through third grade students at the tribe’s educational campus in Kenai.
Board members unanimously approved the application, contingent on an agreement between the district and tribe outlining how school services will be provided. The tribe wants to supply custodial, kitchen, nursing, culture and language services. The district wants to make sure that arrangement is doable with its existing policies and requirements.
Board member Tim Daugharty called the tribe’s application a “marquee example” of how community relationships are developed through education.
“I’m looking forward to seeing how this progresses and being able to help those schools with their culture and the values of the people where they live and that kind of stuff,” he said. “So this is good work and it’s timely and well-needed. Good luck.”
The Tułen charter is valid for five years and its service agreement with the district will be reviewed annually.
Also on Monday, board members voted to renew the existing charter for Aurora Borealis Charter School in Kenai. The school opened in 1997 and prioritizes a classical education with emphasis on grammar, rhetoric and Latin. But during the charter committee’s first meeting last month, members raised concerns about how the school serves students with special needs and those from low-income families.
The school serves a small number of special needs students relative to neighboring schools and the district as a whole. And it doesn’t provide school lunches or bus transportation.
Theo Lexmond is a former school psychologist on the peninsula and special education administrator. He says the committee was right to question whether ABC’s policies are equitable.
“The parents of children with special needs are seeking and deserving of school choice for their kids, just like all parents,” he said. “Asking the question of whether these children are gaining access to the district’s public charter schools in numbers similar to their proportion within the general population is wholly appropriate for the school board to ask.”
ABC’s charter now explicitly states the school will provide services to accommodate students with special needs. It also expands the number of people tasked with ensuring students who use special education services succeed. And it no longer describes a situation where the school might tell some families that it won’t be able to accommodate plans for students with disabilities or who use special education services.
Board member Virginia Morgan also serves on the charter committee. She was the first to question how ABC provides special education services. On Monday, she said she’s satisfied with the new language.
“I just hope that this discussion over the past month and the community conversations around this topic will help more parents of children with disabilities who want their students to attend Aurora Borealis understand that ABC will be able to meet their children’s needs,” she said.
Michelle Maguire, a former ABC secretary, said the new language just codifies what the school’s already been doing.
“We already had these practices going, the verbiage just needed to follow,” she said.
Now that both applications have school board approval, they’ll head to the state for a final OK. The state board of education has 90 days to review the applications before voting them up or down.
