Mat-Su School District to reexamine nurse cuts as school closures move toward board approval

What you need to know:

• District officials will update a budget proposal headed before the school board for a vote later this month to backtrack cuts to district nurses, but plan to keep a proposal to close three district schools.
• The proposal also includes staffing cuts and reduced activity funding, potentially eliminating more than 40 support positions.
• The Mat-Su School District faces a $22.5 million budget shortfall for the 2026-27 school year and is considering a package of cuts, with a school board vote expected March 18.

• Short on time but need the local news scoop? Get free weekly news in your inbox for Mat-Su, from Mat-Su.

PALMER -- Mat-Su School District officials will reexamine a proposal to cut about half of the area’s school nurses, but push forward a proposal to close three school buildings as part of a spending plan heading before the school board for approval this month.

District officials received direction from the school board about what should appear in the final budget proposal during a more than two-hour budget working session Thursday.

School board members said they would prefer no cuts or building closures but know the need to slice spending in the face of an about $22.5 million funding shortfall district officials said they expect for next year.

“There's no cut you can make that is great, or anybody will be happy of,” school board member Kathy McCollum said during the meeting Thursday. “I know that the school consolidation thing is the most emotional. And it wouldn't matter if it was Finger Lake and not Meadow Lakes. It wouldn't matter if it was Cottonwood, and not Larson. It is the same feeling. People love their school.”

The ongoing budget crunch is tied to a series of district income and spending woes, including state education funding that has not kept pace with the rate of inflation, falling student enrollment, rising costs, and payments from the Matanuska-Susitna Borough that do not meet what school officials said are needed levels.

A vote on the proposal is expected at a regular school board meeting scheduled for March 18. Whether all of the reductions during that vote ultimately impact schools will be determined by final funding levels, which are based on state and borough lawmakers and won’t be fully decided until as late as next fall.

A sweeping series of proposed school district cuts was first introduced to the board during a meeting Wednesday, then discussed during the Thursday session. A second workshop is planned for March 16 before the plan heads for a vote later that week.

The cuts include the closure of Glacier View School and Larson and Meadow Lakes elementary schools near Wasilla, increased activity fees, and moving nurses to cover multiple schools each.

School board officials said during the meeting Thursday that they understand the need to close some school buildings but want the district to keep current nursing staff levels and instead come up with an alternative way to cut the $1.7 million that change would have saved.

“I do believe that we need to have medically trained personnel on campus as much as we possibly can,” said school board member Andrew. “Children are averaging sicker, not healthier. I don't believe that a reduction in force in that area would be a smart move. And I don't know about the legality of it.”

That request comes on the heels of more than four hours of public testimony at school and Matanuska-Susitna Borough Assembly meetings early this week asking officials to find ways to avoid cuts, including to school medical staff. Parents, teachers, and students packed the school board and assembly chambers, waving signs and cheering as commenters spoke for up to three minutes each.

Staff from Glacier View School said closing their facility will strand students and residents without a center that functions as a de facto community hub for the rural area. About a dozen students are expected to enroll in the school next year, all of whom will need to switch to online learning or ride a bus about 40 miles to Sutton for elementary school or about 60 miles to Palmer for middle and high school.

“I understand we cost a lot of money – I get it,” Amber Allen, an administrative secretary at Glacier View School, told the school board Wednesday. “The thing about closing Glacier View School is that those kids who attend there and live there, they don't have another school to go to. They don’t have access to education.”

Parents and teachers at Meadow Lakes said their school has a large special-needs student population, in part because it hosts the Reaching Independence through Supported Education, or RISE, program. Closing the school will cause disruptions to students for whom stability is critical, they said.

“If the building closes, the students do not disappear. Their needs do not change. They still require appropriate placements, transportation, staffing and support,” Carrie Johnson, whose son Clinton attends RISE at Meadow Lakes, said during the assembly meeting Tuesday. “Children in special education rely deeply on consistency. For a child at RISE, being forced to move to another school can undo months, even years, of hard-earned growth for students like Clinton.”

School district officials said they will relocate the programs and their enrolled students to a new facility if the closure is approved. They said Meadow Lakes Elementary has a high special needs population because the district currently operates special needs programs out of the building, including RISE -- not because students zoned for the area have a high rate of special needs.

School board members and district officials on Thursday said the chosen cuts -- including the school closures -- are necessary if the district doesn’t want to reduce teachers instead and increase the number of students in each classroom.

If approved, the school closures are expected to save $3.83 million, according to a district fact sheet provided at the meeting Thursday.

The proposal going before the school board for a vote late this month also includes cuts to more than 40 staff members, including nine administrators, about 16 elementary school instructional coaches, seven high school and middle school librarians, about seven records specialists, and some elementary specialists, district officials said Thursday.

The plan also reduces funding for sports and other school activities. Instead of cutting specific sports, the district plans to let each school decide how to use the reduced funding it has for transportation and coach payments. 

That means families may be expected to drive their students to certain games or meets rather than using district bus service, and some after-school clubs may no longer be offered because there is no funding to pay teachers to oversee them, officials said. 

Those proposed cuts may be reduced by raising activity fees paid by families, they said. Specific fee increases could be presented as part of the March 16 budget meeting.

-- Contact Amy Bushatz at contact@matsusentinel.com