Grandpa isn’t the only one who had to walk a mile in the snow to school. Anchorage students may be able to tell their own grandchildren about the travails of getting to class during the time of Covid.
Due to a lack of bus drivers, the Anchorage School District Student Transportation Department has suspended bus service on some routes starting Monday.
“The action is necessary due to a shortage of bus drivers resulting from driver attrition and the impacts of COVID-19 on the Transportation staff. The administration aspires to resume normal service as soon as possible but is presently unable to determine the duration of this program,” the district wrote.
The school system developed a rotating system of temporary service suspensions based on specific bus routes to allow families to anticipate and plan for alternative means of getting children to school.
The district has endeavored to not just impact one route, and one set of students, but to spread the pain among all, with the aim of impacting the fewest families practicable.
The bus suspension is not affecting special education students or those attending Title 1 (low income) schools.
Corey Allen Young is leaving the governor’s media team and joining Mayor Dave Bronson’s office as his communication director. He has been deputy press secretary for Gov. Mike Dunleavy, and earlier worked in the Walker Administration in various communications capacities, including the Department of Corrections.
“Corey Allen Young brings a level of experience in media, government and non-profit communications that will prove invaluable for my team and the Municipality of Anchorage. His wealth of experience and knowledge for our community, particularly as a born and raised resident, will serve the Municipality well as we work to advance critical priorities relating to housing and homelessness, economic development, public safety and more,” said Mayor Bronson. “I want to personally thank Governor Dunleavy for sharing such a talented individual with our team and look forward to our continued work together on behalf of Alaska.”
Young has worked in television news as a journalist in Fairbanks and Anchorage with KXD, KIMO, KTVA, and KTUU. He has worked in Special Education for the Fairbanks North Star Borough School District at West Valley High School.
He has also worked in communications for Catholic Social Services Alaska and Charis Bible College, served on boards for Standing Together Against Rape, Children’s Meal Mission, and Alaska Adoption Services and has coached youth football and basketball with East Anchorage High School, West Valley High School, Boys and Girls Club Alaska, and the YMCA of Alaska for more than 20 years.
Young is a graduate of East Anchorage High School and Marquette University. He begins work at City Hall on Monday.
Matt Shuckerow will continue working as an adviser but will return to the consulting and communications with the firm he founded, Fathom Strategic Communications, after managing Sen. Dan Sullivan successful 2020 reelection campaign. Shuckerow was communications director during the Bronson transition and for the first seven weeks of his administration, as a temporary assignment.
The Anchorage Assembly decided today to move up the recall election for Meg Zaletel to Oct. 26.
Earlier, it had been looking for dates in November, but opponents of the recall had pressed hard for an earlier date in order to mobilize the leftist ballot harvesting ground game.
Ballots will go out about Oct. 10.
Zaletel is subject to a recall in District 4, which is midtown Anchorage.
Her critics are unhappy with her performance on the Assembly, where she prioritizes the needs of the homeless at the expense and danger of taxpayers and family neighborhoods. She was part of the move to purchase hotels for vagrants and drug addicts, a plan put in place by former Mayor Ethan Berkowitz last summer.
The effort to recall Zaletel began a year ago, but she blocked it with various court delays. Finally, the Alaska Supreme Court agreed that Alaska law allows lawmakers to be recalled for just about anything, and they gave the Municipality orders to proceed.
Russell Biggs and a loose group of grassroots activists under the banners of “Reclaim Midtown” and “Save Anchorage” mobilized to gather over 4,000 signatures from District 4.
Because the cost of a special election is significant, Assemblyman Chris Constant said that District 4 should have to pay for it. It was a suggestion that didn’t gain much support.
An ordinance passed last week that created a board of homeless people to talk about and advise the city on homelessness has been vetoed by Mayor Dave Bronson. It’s his first veto of an Assembly ordinance.
“As you know, the Municipality already has a Homeless. Housing. and Neighborhood Development (HHAND) Board specifically designated to ‘advise the Mayor and the Assembly on issues related to long and short-term housing, homeless and community development needs… and strategies to effect revitalization of lower-income and at risk neighborhoods,'” the mayor wrote.
“Moreover, the stated purpose of the proposed Houseless Lived Experience Anchorage’ resources should be used to focus on helping those experiencing homelessness rather than to just talk about it,” he said.
The “lived experience” homeless board is a pet project of Assemblyman Felix Rivera and Assemblywoman Meg Zaletel, who is facing recall.
It’s expected that the leftist Assembly will take up the veto and consider overriding it at their next Assembly meeting.
Anchorage Mayor Dave Bronson today named Judy Eledge as the new director of libraries.
Last week the Anchorage Assembly refused to confirm Bronson’s first choice for Anchorage librarian. As an answer to their insult, the mayor made Sami Graham his chief of staff, and told the Assembly that her office would be located in the Z.J. Loussac Library.
But evidently that was a short-lived idea.
Instead, Bronson appointed a Republican activist to be his choice for libraries. Eledge is the president of the Anchorage Republican Women’s Club and has long been active in campaigning. She was one of two electors in the recent presidential election, and ran for school board this spring.
Eledge, like Graham, doesn’t have a master’s of library science degree, which the liberal members of the Assembly say is an essential requirement. Like Graham, Eledge is an educator by training and experience.
Eledge has lived in Alaska for over 40 years and spent 16 years as a teacher in the Anchorage School District.
While her children were in the school system, Eledge was was Chugiak High School PTA president and was honored as the Chugiak High School Volunteer of the Year. She also served on the Alaska State Board of Education, Anchorage Chamber of Commerce Education Committee, Municipal Health Commission, board of directors for Learning Disabilities Association of AK, and was recognized in the American Registry of Who’s Who in Education.
Since retiring as a rural principal in 2003, Eledge has worked all over Alaska in school improvement under four commissioners of Education. She was appointed the Alaska State Reading Council Coordinator to spearhead an Alaska K-3 Reading Plan. She has her bachelor of science in elementary education from Sul Ross State University, her master’s in teaching from Alaska Pacific University, and her administration certificate from the University of Alaska Anchorage.
Eledge most certainly will be rejected by the Anchorage Assembly’s leftist majority.
The Fairbanks District Attorney’s Office on Friday charged 17-year-old Jamison Gallion for his role as the arsonist in seven fires occurring in the Two Rivers-Pleasant Valley area this year.
Gallion now faces multiple counts of arson, burglary, and criminal mischief, after making admissions to law enforcement about his conduct.
Gallion is charged with Arson in the Second Degree, Burglary in the Second Degree, and Criminal Mischief in the First Degree in each of three fires: the May 16, 2021 fire at the Pleasant Valley Thrift Store, the June 19, 2021 fire at the Pleasant Valley Community Center, and the August 18, 2021 fire at Wagons’ North. He also faces charges of Arson in the First Degree and Criminal Mischief in the First Degree for the fire that burned a residence on July 3, 2021, as well as charges of Arson in the Second Degree and Criminal Mischief in the Third Degree for the Community Center fire on July 24, 2021.
Gallion further faces charges of Arson in the Second Degree, Burglary in the Second Degree, and Criminal Mischief in the Third Degree for the August 19, 2021 fire at the structure on 3838 Chena Hot Springs Road. For the August 23, 2021 fire that burned the Two Rivers Lodge, Gallion is charged with Arson in the First Degree and Criminal Mischief in the First Degree.
Although a juvenile, Gallion is being charged as an adult, which is permitted by Alaska law when 16 or 17 year olds are charged with certain offenses, including Arson in the First Degree.
The charges in the charging document are only allegations and are not evidence of guilt. Gallion is presumed innocent and is entitled to a fair trial at which the prosecution must prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.
Gallion was arraigned today in Fairbanks District Court. Bail was set at $1 million cash performance. He is currently being held at Fairbanks Youth Facility. The next court date is a preliminary hearing on Sept. 2, at 3:15 p.m. in courtroom 102 at the Rabinowitz Courthouse in Fairbanks.
U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski released a statement Friday about the Thursday attack that left at least 13 American servicemen dead and many others wounded in Kabul, Afghanistan:
“I have long supported withdrawing U.S. troops from Afghanistan, but the manner in which the drawdown has taken place has been chaotic and irresponsible and led to the horrific scenes we have witnessed over the last 12 days. It is devastating to see that American troops were targeted, injured, and killed while protecting the airport. My deepest condolences go out to their families and loved ones. It is important to remember that their mission has not been in vain as thousands of Americans and tens of thousands of allies and vulnerable Afghans have been safely evacuated. We must continue our focus on the mission our military were sent to defend: bringing our people home and helping those who have helped us.
“My office continues to respond to many, many constituents who have requested evacuation assistance for their family members, friends, colleagues, and loved ones. Due to this enormous evacuation effort, the State Department has not been able to provide updates at the individual level. In just the last 12 days, over 82,000 people have been evacuated from Kabul. My staff will continue to help constituents in need and when the timing is appropriate, I will ensure full accountability for the decisions made within this administration. The time now is to honor those who have fallen and ensure their mission is carried out. President Biden committed to the American people that he will ensure any American who wishes to leave the country is able to do so and that those terrorists that attacked and killed our service members will pay the price. They will not win. I intend to hold the president to those words.”
Read the statements of Sen. Dan Sullivan, Congressman Don Young, Gov. Mike Dunleavy and others at this link:
President Joe Biden ordered U.S. flags to be flown at half-staff from Aug. 26 through sunset on Aug. 30 in honor of the victims of the attack on U.S. service members and other victims in the terrorist attack at the Kabul Airport on Aug. 26.
The flags on all federal buildings and grounds, military posts, naval vessels, embassies, consular offices and other places are under this proclamation. Typically, states and municipalities follow suit.
The number of U.S. servicemen who died in the attack has risen to 13.
Education and knowledge translates into power. Education does not parallel economics or politics, but is the soul of the society, and more fundamental than these others. Education determines people’s moral values, appearance, eating habits, the role of citizens; it shapes behavioral and subsistence strategies.
Today, unfortunately, there are several weak areas in the primary and secondary education system in the United States and in Alaska in particular: the absence of a unified methodology for teaching, a lack of consistency in school policies, a weak academic curriculum (compared to other technologically advanced countries), and an often– unsavory school environment.
In addition, some researchers suggest that the U.S. educational crisis is more social than academic, including a remarkable indoctrination of our youth in the divisive “white privilege” and “critical race” doctrines, the 1619 Project and “gender identity” theory.
While some educational experts recommend American schools adopt aspects of our Asian and West European counterparts—longer school year and more rigorous requirements—in order to raise the scholastic level of U.S. students, other researchers indicate that recently immigrated children of Asian, European and Russian origin are able to excel in the American school system as it exists.
Despite hardships and limited knowledge of English and western cultural values, these children quickly adapt to their new school environments and rapidly excel within the first few years of schooling.
In the late 1990s, the California Achievement Test (CAT), for example, demonstrated that the performance of newly arrived students was exceptional. Their mean overall score on the CAT was in the 54th percentile, placing them just above the national average. Evidently, the lowest scores were found in the language and reading test, not a surprising as English was their second language. In this case, the mean score was slightly below the national average.
How can we explain the remarkable performance of newly arrived immigrants in a foreign social and economic environment? What social stimulus forces newly arrived immigrants to perform better in school than those who have lived in this country for three or four generations?
It appears some factors were parental encouragement, dedication to learning, family pride in educational excellence, a clear realization that education is the most important “instrument” for success in the highly competitive American society, collective consciousness among members of the nuclear family and most importantly, sustaining conservative moral values in the family.
Studies showed that conservative moral values play an important role in the educational achievement of children. In my 18 years of teaching at the Alyeska Central School (a former correspondence school affiliated with the Alaska Department of Education and Early Development), my best and most outstanding students were from conservative, religious, and traditional families.
On the national level, among Southeast Asians, for example, the Confucian and Buddhist code of behavior (harmonious relationships between parents and children, subjects and rulers, men and women, rich and poor) is a main source of motivation and direction in their life. The family is the central institution in these ethnic groups, where achievement and knowledge are admired and encouraged.
Nowhere is the family’s commitment to education more evident than in time spent on homework. During high school, Indochinese students spend an average of three hours per day; in junior high, an average of 2.5 hours; and in grade school, an average of 2 hours per day.
Research in the U.S. shows that American students study at home about 1.5 hours per day at the junior and senior high school levels. Studies also found that parents who attributed greater importance to fun and excitement than to education had children who achieved lower grade point averages: 2.90 as opposed to 3.14.
The result for children of parents who valued material possessions more highly than education were similar: GPAs were 2.66 versus 3.19.
It is essential to remember that school is not an entertainment center, but an institution where teachers share their knowledge with students in the most harmonious, professional and effective way. A teacher is the fundamental “instrument” of education. No brilliant policy, effective administration or sophisticated technology will ever replace the harmony of teacher–student relationships.
If we want to deal effectively with the crises in America and Alaska education, we must address the problem of professional educators who serve as frontline social activists for radical political groups that seek to indoctrinate and brainwash our youth in neo-Marxist ideology—such as today’s popular and divisive “white privilege” and “critical race” doctrines.
Social engineering to create a new identity by imploring radical socialist ideology in our school system does not work, as well as meaningless concepts in education, such as “gender identity,” “white privilege” and “critical race” doctrines or “critical thinking”— if thinking is not critical, then it is not thinking.
My mother was an outstanding primary/elementary school teacher for 32 years. She taught basic and fundamental skills to her students; and none of these bumper–sticker nonsense. If our teachers just do that, we would be in a much better place in our education system today.
For American schools to succeed, parents, families and communities must become more committed to the basic education of their children. Families, especially, must create within the home an environment conducive to learning by participating in the process so that their children feel comfortable learning, and then go to school willing and prepared to study.
On the other side, schools must reach out to the families and engage them meaningfully in the education of their children—identifying cultural and moral values and educational methods for success that might enhance students’ scholastic achievement. Schools must empower families by directly involving them in the educational process, providing support and training to parents when necessary.
Unconventional means of schooling such as correspondence studies with emphasis on home schooling should continue to be applied effectively in Alaska as a viable and family–controlled educational system that provides students with excellent instruction, a safe study environment and parental involvement that is critical key to children’s educational success.
Here is the bottom line: Place a student from a home that values education in a class with an impartial teacher who loves and proficient in his/her subject and enjoys teaching, and learning takes place. Everything else is a “window dressing.”
Parents, especially rational and conservative parents, get out of your closets, be courageous and make your voice heard. This “gender identity,” “critical race” and “white privilege” madness is not going away by itself. Teachers who advocate neo-Marxist ideology in the classrooms must be challenged by YOU!!
Alexander B. Dolitsky was born and raised in Kiev in the former Soviet Union. He received an M.A. in history from Kiev Pedagogical Institute, Ukraine, in 1976; an M.A. in anthropology and archaeology from Brown University in 1983; and was enroled in the Ph.D. program in Anthropology at Bryn Mawr College from 1983 to 1985, where he was also a lecturer in the Russian Center. In the U.S.S.R., he was a social studies teacher for three years, and an archaeologist for five years for the Ukranian Academy of Sciences. In 1978, he settled in the United States. Dolitsky visited Alaska for the first time in 1981, while conducting field research for graduate school at Brown. He lived first in Sitka in 1985 and then settled in Juneau in 1986. From 1985 to 1987, he was a U.S. Forest Service archaeologist and social scientist. He was an Adjunct Assistant Professor of Russian Studies at the University of Alaska Southeast from 1985 to 1999; Social Studies Instructor at the Alyeska Central School, Alaska Department of Education from 1988 to 2006; and has been the Director of the Alaska-Siberia Research Center (see www.aksrc.homestead.com) from 1990 to present. He has conducted about 30 field studies in various areas of the former Soviet Union (including Siberia), Central Asia, South America, Eastern Europe and the United States (including Alaska). Dolitsky has been a lecturer on the World Discoverer, Spirit of Oceanus, andClipper Odyssey vessels in the Arctic and sub-Arctic regions. He was the Project Manager for the WWII Alaska-Siberia Lend Lease Memorial, which was erected in Fairbanks in 2006. He has published extensively in the fields of anthropology, history, archaeology, and ethnography. His more recent publications include Fairy Tales and Myths of the Bering Strait Chukchi, Ancient Tales of Kamchatka; Tales and Legends of the Yupik Eskimos of Siberia; Old Russia in Modern America: Russian Old Believers in Alaska; Allies in Wartime: The Alaska-Siberia Airway During WWII; Spirit of the Siberian Tiger: Folktales of the Russian Far East; Living Wisdom of the Far North: Tales and Legends from Chukotka and Alaska; Pipeline to Russia; The Alaska-Siberia Air Route in WWII; and Old Russia in Modern America: Living Traditions of the Russian Old Believers; Ancient Tales of Chukotka, and Ancient Tales of Kamchatka.
