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September 16, 2024
Dear ÅÝܽÊÓƵapp Community,
I hope you are settling comfortably into your routines. As a district, now is the time to plan for the future, which includes taking the next steps in our Rightsizing ASD initiative that was launched last school year. This process entails making difficult decisions to more properly resource our schools for the long-term, despite many years of stagnant and unpredictable funding from the State.
As we prepare to move forward, I want to hear from you.
For this reason, I am writing to provide you with important information on how the District will evaluate the size of its operational footprint. As I’ve previously written, ASD largely operates the same number of schools despite serving thousands fewer students and even fewer in the years to come.
Last spring, we took the first step in asking your initial opinions on Rightsizing ASD and reimagining how we use our buildings. In that community survey, 71% expressed support for closing, combining, or repurposing schools. The survey also identified a strong desire to retain special programs and participants’ neighborhood schools. You can learn more about the results of that community survey in .
Your feedback has been invaluable as we move forward with the next phase of the Rightsizing process. Now, we’d like to seek your input on the metrics that will be used to evaluate our facilities. The insights you provide will play a key role in shaping the District’s Rightsizing plan, which will be submitted to the Anchorage School Board for review and discussion later this year.
I recognize that schools are the heart of our communities, and that conversations about rightsizing our footprint are incredibly emotional and challenging for our families. However, our long-term enrollment and financial outlook is also deeply concerning, and I feel it is necessary to advance this conversation. We must carefully consider the option of reducing our footprint to ensure we make the most of our limited resources for the benefit of more students. I am concerned that by taking no action, our schools will continue to lose the essential resources needed to improve student learning.
At this critical juncture, we again ask for your input. By taking this survey, you will help us better understand your perspective on which factors should be prioritized to identify buildings to close, combine, or repurpose. This survey closes on Sept. 30.
Please continue to visit this page to learn more about this effort, the timeline for decisions, and how you can stay involved. Thank you for your time and engagement during this difficult process.
Sincerely,
Jharrett M. Bryantt, Ed.D.
Superintendent
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Previous Messages
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The ÅÝܽÊÓƵapp (ASD) is initiating the Rightsizing ASD initiative due to pressing needs and changing community dynamics.
ASD’s infrastructure is aging; many buildings are over 30 years old and in need of critical upgrades and maintenance. As our buildings age, our population is decreasing. Demographic shifts in Anchorage include a decrease in working-age adults and fewer students enrolled in ASD over the past decade.
However, more families are opting for different modalities of learning. Correspondence school enrollment has more than doubled since the 2014-15 school year. Similarly, enrollment in ASD choice programs has grown over time. Most of ASD’s charter schools are housed in leased buildings with high rent payments or in buildings that are unsuitable in size or design to fully accommodate their growing enrollment.
Our underutilized campuses present a major barrier that could be sustainably addressed with an intentional school consolidation plan. ASD is seeking community input to thoughtfully reimagine, redesign, and rightsize ASD to offer a world-class education tailored to future realities, conditions, and resources.
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The Anchorage working-age population has declined more than 17,000 residents (8.5% decline) in the last decade, and ASD student enrollment has declined approximately 5,000 students (9.6% decline). Birth rates among Anchorage residents since 2018 have continued to decrease among child-bearing adults and we have seen that this trend is common across the nation.The outmigration of residents in the Anchorage community is consistent in many boroughs across Alaska. According to the State, Alaska has lost more movers than it has gained every year since 2013. Twenty-one of Alaska’s 30 boroughs and census areas lost population over the year. Complete estimates for the state, boroughs/census areas, cities and census-designated places are available .
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ASD’s students require more specialized services, beyond the education classroom, than in the past.
Schools with low enrollment are challenged with providing the same level of service that can be supported at larger schools. Small schools see the following impacts across a district as large as Anchorage.
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Specialty teachers (art, music, PE, and special education) and Specialists (speech, counseling, literacy coaches, occupational & physical therapists, speech language pathologists, etc.) spend significant amounts of time traveling to multiple schools, lowering the amount of time they can spend with students.
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Combination classes in elementary schools have become more common. For instance, there may be only one 1st grade class and one 2nd grade class that are both small, so they are merged in order to make up a whole class. These combined classes make it more difficult for teachers to spend individual time with each student.
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At middle and high schools, small enrollments end up reducing course offerings, the amount of times desired classes can be taught in a single day, and access to sports and extracurricular activities.
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Schools with 3 or more sections per grade (3 first grade classes, 3 second grade classes, etc.) generally have more resources for students.
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Schools with less than 2 sections per grade will routinely see many or most of the challenges discussed in the preceding bullets.
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