ASD superintendent withdrawals support for STEAM program that would eliminate teaching positions

The Anchorage School District (ASD) administration is withdrawing an initial proposal to cut art classes and health teachers, as a way to fix the district’s nearly $100 million budget deficit.

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (KTUU) – The Anchorage School District administration withdrew an initial proposal to cut art and health teachers as a way to help fix the district’s nearly $100 million budget deficit.

During a school board meeting on Tuesday, Superintendent Jharrett Bryantt announced he was no longer proposing creating the STEAM program, which would reduce the number of teachers by integrating art into other curricula like science, technology, engineering and math. The STEAM classes would also have been used to replace the IGNITE program.

In an interview on Wednesday, school board member Dave Donley emphasized it’s the school board who will decide the fate of the proposal.

“I do not believe you’re going to see a large push to undo what the administration is proposing but at the same time, that’s up to the board at our next meeting, which will be exclusively on voting for the budget,” Donley said.

According to Donley, cuts for art and health teachers could still occur next week.

In addition, IGNITE still faces the potential of being cut. At the moment, the cut would shrivel the program’s staff from 20 teachers to just two, allowing the district to save about $2.4 million.

“For many years, I’ve been suggesting reductions in administrative overhead targeted toward non-classroom expenses,” Donley said. “This is the first year the administration has come forward with some reductions in administrative costs and I think that’s a really good first step. I think there’s a lot more that can be done there to save some of these very valuable programs for our students.”

Donley said the school board is faced with making difficult decisions for Anchorage’s public schools.

“Nobody wants to be in the process of closing public schools or cutting very important programs to families,” he said. “This is not something that the board wants to do.”

The school board will vote on the budget next week, Tuesday, Feb. 27.

“The president announced there would be some limited public testimony at that meeting, but the main function of that meeting will be to move forward with amendments and adopt a budget,” he said.

From there, the budget must be sent to the Anchorage Assembly by March 4.

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