The 2024 legislative session is underway.
The Senate Education Committee meets Wednesday to hear about chronic student absenteeism and tune into our lunch & learn presentation on Friday about a "Yes, and..." approach to education policy.
The much anticipated 2024 legislative session started today. While I fully recognize there are political divisions in the Alaska State Legislature that will be hard to overcome, I am confident that we have good people working hard here in Juneau for the people of Alaska.
As I have said previously, my #1 priority is addressing the growing crisis in public education. Last session, we heard from experts, researchers, teachers, parents, and students about the major issues facing our schools. After dozens of hearings, it became apparent that the most effective way to retain classroom educators, fix the leaking roofs, and get kids to school is to give school districts the funding they need. Raising the Base Student Allocation (BSA) will allow school districts to retain quality educators, address deferred school maintenance, and reduce class sizes so our teachers can increase the contact time with each kiddo and get our students the one-on-one support they need.
Without a BSA increase or some other infusion of resources into our public schools the State of Alaska will continue shortchanging the future academic and economic success of Alaska’s children. Providing adequate funding for public education is a priority I share with my colleagues in the bipartisan Alaska Senate Majority, and I am confident it is a priority shared by a majority of the members of the Alaska State Legislature.
Increasing the BSA requires all of us to work together, including you. Now is the time to call your legislators and encourage them to raise the BSA. The next few days are critical as lawmakers consider overriding the Governor’s veto of one-time funding for our schools. Also, the Alaska House of Representatives is considering Senate Bill 140, which leverages federal dollars for broadband expansion across our rural and remote school districts and increases the Base Student Allocation by $680 per student. The bill also allocates more funds for student transportation and residential school programs.
You can watch all of the upcoming committee hearings (SB 140 has a hearing scheduled for Wednesday, January 17th at 4 pm) and floor sessions on the Alaska Legislature’s website at AKL.tv. You can also follow the work of the Alaska Legislature on Gavel Alaska. Also, please take advantage of the opportunities to provide public comments, which I guarantee makes a difference when lawmakers are making decisions.
Chronic student absenteeism is a problem in Alaska.
On Wednesday, the Senate Education Committee will hold its first meeting of the 2024 session. The topic is chronic student absenteeism, which the data clearly shows is a factor in poor student performance.
Thankfully, the nation’s foremost expert on student absenteeism has agreed to share her research and expertise with the members of the Senate Education Committee. Hedy Chang is the Executive Director and President of Attendance Works, which works to advance student success by reducing chronic student absenteeism. Chang co-authored the seminal report "Present, Engaged and Accounted For: The Critical Importance of Addressing Chronic Absence in the Early Grades" and in 2013 she was named a Champion of Change by the White House for her commitment to furthering African American Education. During her presentation on Wednesday, Cheng will focus on Alaska’s growing chronic student absenteeism problem. In 2022, there were 59,504 chronically absent students in Alaska, and 86% of schools are challenged by high and extreme rates of chronic absences.
While chronic student absenteeism is known to hamper a student’s academic success it also often signals that students are experiencing things like a lack of transportation options, mental health issues, or untreated health conditions. I am hopeful that Wednesday’s Senate Education Committee meeting will shed some light on the absenteeism issue and result in some tangible policies for lawmakers and school districts across Alaska to consider.
“The challenges have been compounded by an epidemic of absenteeism, as students who grew accustomed to missing school during the pandemic continue to do so after the resumption of in-person classes. Millions of young people have joined the ranks of the chronically absent — those who miss 10 percent or more of the days in the school year — and for whom absenteeism will translate into gaps in learning. In the early grades, these missing children are at greater risk of never mastering the comprehension skills that make education possible. The more absences these students accumulate, the more they miss out on the process of socialization through which young people learn to live and work with others. The more they lag academically, the more likely they are to drop out.” – New York Time Editorial Board
The first meeting of the Senate Education Committee for the 2024 legislative session will begin at 3:30 pm on Wednesday, January 17. You can watch the hearing live on the Gavel Alaska website and on AKL.tv, which is the Alaska State Legislature’s website for streaming committee meetings and floor sessions.
It’s time for a “yes, and…” approach to education policy
On Friday, January 19 at noon, I am hosting a lunch and learn presentation for lawmakers and staff in the Alaska legislature to hear from a prominent education policy expert. Chad Aldeman is part of the Edunomics Lab at Georgetown University and writes about education finance policy and teacher labor markets.
Last year, I read an opinion piece from Aldeman titled It’s Time for a “Yes, and…” Approach to Education Policy. I wholeheartedly agree with this approach to education policy, which is why I invited Chad to discuss the concept further with lawmakers and staff from the Alaska House and Senate during a working lunch. Friday’s lunch and learn presentation begins at noon and will be streamed live on the Alaska Legislature’s website at AKL.tv.
“There’s a rule of thumb in improv comedy that performers are supposed to take a “Yes, and…” approach to a skit. Even if they had a different vision for how the action should play out, the comedy works better when performers accept contributions as they come in and build on them. In education, we’ve tended toward the opposite, a “No, but…” approach. As I outlined in a recent piece for SlowBoring.com, education policy has swung wildly from one fad to the next in search of a silver bullet. We had a national reading program… until Congress got rid of it. We had a national tutoring program… until we didn’t. We can’t afford this type of approach right now. With student achievement, attendance, and behavior all well below their pre-pandemic levels, it’s past time to adopt a “Yes, and…” approach in education.” - Chad Aldeman
Kayla’s Constituent Corner: Contact your lawmaker and tell them about your issues.
Dear Friend or Neighbor,
As the 2024 legislative session gets started, it is the perfect time to contact your legislator for help and to inform them about your issues. And while the start of the session may appear like an inconvenient time to call your Representative or Senator, the tumult now is only a small snowball compared to the avalanche to come. Right now, legislators and their staff are consumed with learning about the issues that will be voted on this year and trying to persuade others to see issues through their constituent’s perspectives. So you should call now because “if not now, when?”
Do not be daunted about seeking assistance with a problem or sharing your thoughts with your legislator and staff. That is their job, and they truly want to know what you think and how they can help you. Reach out to them by phone, email, or Public Opinion Message (POM). POMs are brief communications sent from citizens to legislators via the legislative computer system. The POM program is not intended to replace other forms of communication such as personal letters. Rather, it is designed to provide Alaskans with a timely forum for expressing their views on legislative issues. POMs are taken and sent only during legislative sessions. If you wish to send an online POM go to akleg.gov/poms/. To send an online POM you will need to input your personal information as it appears on your voter registration card. You can also mail, fax, or hand deliver your signed message to any Legislative Information Office (LIO). POMs may not exceed 50 words. They must include the sender's name, address, telephone number, and the name of the receiving legislator(s). They may not contain vulgar or obscene language.
For those of you who plan to visit Juneau, make an appointment as soon as you can because committees and people who have made appointments before you will have priority. Not coming to Juneau? Call the office. You may speak to the legislator or an aide focused on your issue.
The Alaska Legislature’s website is a great resource for research. If you go online to akleg.gov you can find in-depth information about the legislation under consideration this year. You can also find contact information for the members of the House and Senate and look at the daily calendar of committee meetings.
2024 may be a productive year or a mostly frustrating year for the issues you care about. Just know that Sen. Tobin and her staff care about what we do and we care about you and how we can make your life better. Wish us luck this year.
Kayla
Thanks, Loki! You might want to share this speech by Ulysses S. Grant in 1875 with fellow legislators who are reluctant to fund education in Alaska at necessary levels:
I encourage you to support overriding the veto of educational funding by our Governor.This speech by Ulysses S. Grant in Iowa in 1875 provides some "ammunition" for your discussions:
I do not bring into this assemblage politics, certainly not partisan politics, but it is a fair subject for soldiers in their deliberations to consider what may be necessary to secure the prize for which they battled in a republic like ours. Where the citizen is sovereign and the official the servant, where no power is exercised except by the will of the people, it is important that the sovereign — the people — should possess intelligence.
The free school is the promoter of that intelligence which is to preserve us as a free nation. If we are to have another contest in the near future of our national existence, I predict that the dividing line will not be Mason and Dixon's, but between patriotism and intelligence on the one side, and superstition, ambition, and ignorance on the other.
Now in this centennial year of our national existence, I believe it a good time to begin the work of strengthening the foundation of the house commenced by our patriotic forefathers one hundred years ago, at Concord and Lexington. Let us all labor to add all needful guarantees for the more perfect security of free thought, free speech, and free press, pure morals, unfettered religious sentiments, and of equal rights and privileges to all men, irrespective of nationality, color, or religion.
Encourage free schools, and resolve that not one dollar of money appropriated to their support, no matter how raised, shall be appropriated to the support of any sectarian school. Resolve that the State or Nation, or both combined, shall furnish to every child growing up in the land, the means of acquiring a good common-school education, unmixed with sectarian, pagan, or atheistic tenets. Leave the matter of religion to the family altar, the church, and the private school supported entirely by private contributions. Keep the church and state forever separate. With these safeguards, I believe the battles which created the Army of the Tennessee will not have been fought in vain.
www.presidency.ucsb.edu/...
A bit of personal history: My parents thought private Christian education was important and sent me and my sister to a private Christian school. They opposed any support from the government, thinking it might reroute funds for public education ( my Dad taught in a public high school) and come with possible state control.
I wish you well in this legislative session.
Sincerely,
Jon R. Sharpe