Anchorage’s public schools serve more than 7,000 students with disabilities, each supported by an Individualized Education Plan. These are children whose needs range from significant physical disabilities to conditions that can be harder to see.
Special education provides the widest range of support of any program in the Anchorage School District. In classrooms across our city, teachers are helping students who cannot yet speak or eat solid food, while others support students who need the right tools and strategies to learn. These educators work alongside specialists in speech, occupational therapy, audiology, and vocational training, all focused on ensuring that students with disabilities are welcomed and receive a high-quality education.
The attempt to gut the U.S. Office of Special Education threatens all of that important work. This office ensures that schools and families have access to fair investigations when discrimination occurs and helps districts improve services through research, innovation, and professional development. In fact, it was a federal investigation that ended the unjust practice of isolating students with behavioral disabilities in the Anchorage School District.
Removing that oversight would take us backward and harm the students who need help the most.
Alaska cannot fill this gap on its own. The state’s Office of Special Education has only two employees to serve as many as 20,000 students who qualify for disability support. Losing federal guidance and research will leave our educators without the tools, training, and resources they need to help every child succeed. Anchorage teachers already carry a heavy load supporting students whose disabilities range from profound physical challenges to learning differences such as autism, ADHD, and dyslexia.
As a candidate for the Anchorage School Board, I will continue to advocate for the 7,000 Anchorage students who rely on special education services and the educators who serve them.
I urge all Alaskans to contact Senators Murkowski and Sullivan, as well as Representative Begich, and demand that the Office of Special Education be restored. Our community has a responsibility to protect every child’s right to learn, to belong, and to thrive.