The Karluk Tribal Council, which didn’t have enough students to open its school, paid a couple of families from the Lower 48 an all-expense move to the village so it would have enough students to open the school. The families would have all their expenses paid for a year to live in Karluk and enroll their children in the school.
Two families were chosen out of numerous applicants.
On Oct. 24, the Karluk school board met in an emergency meeting and voted to close the school again, after both of the families that were chosen for the honor of living in the village left, and took their children with them after only one month.
The tactic of getting enough children to attract state funding for the school made national news after a social media campaign was placed this summer.
Karluk is located on Kodiak Island and was once a thriving village with a fish cannery. The village is down to about 20 residents and the school closed in 2018.
According to KMXT radio, the district will try to get the State to send money for the students for the weeks they did attend, but other than that, the district is short about $80,000 for the experiment.
