AFP-AK: Fast Facts: Alaska Education
Record High Spending with Record Low Educational Outcomes
Fast Facts: Alaska Education
While Alaskan legislators are looking to provide a massive increase in dollars going to school districts, there are a number of other reforms lawmakers should consider that would have a better impact in the lives of students and their families throughout the state. Lawmakers should consider these reforms to the current, broken system: educational choice, public schools without borders, expansion of charter school authorizers, transportation grants for families, and increased correspondence student funding.
- Education spending is the second-largest category of Alaska’s budget: the Department of Education and Early Development (DEED) is budgeted $1.67 billion for fiscal year 2023 (July 2022 – June 2023).
- Alaska has much higher per-pupil expenditures than the nationwide average—$22,000 per student, the sixth highest in the nation—but Alaskan students lag in academic performance, ranking 49th in education according to the Casey Foundation in 2022. Alaska’s current spending per pupil is 23% higher than the U.S. average.
- Between 2002 and 2020, Alaska saw a 0.7% drop in enrollment from 133,000 students to 132,000 students, yet current spending growth has kept pace with revenue growth, increasing 32% per pupil. Correspondence school enrollment has risen to 16.3% of students.
- Since 2002, Alaska has grown its education revenues and spending by nearly a third while enrollment in brick-and-mortar schools has declined. Increases in support services have quickly outpaced the lean increases in teaching salaries.
- To improve Alaska’s dismal education outcomes, funding should be used to directly support students instead of just increasing generalized education funding.
- Alaska is falling behind on all education fronts but one—Alaska’s charter schools lead the nation in math and reading performance.
- Alaska should codify an open-enrollment policy that allows students to choose and attend the public school that serves their specific needs, whether that be their residentially assigned school or a different public school in the state.
- Public schools were designed to be free and public. Alaska should honor that principle and ensure that public schools across the state are truly free and public for all Alaska students.
- Alaska’s current correspondence program should be fully funded (it is currently only funded at 90%). Alaska legislators should focus on leveling the financial playing field for families who choose charter and correspondence programs for their children over traditional neighborhood schools.
Paid for by Americans for Prosperity - Alaska, Anchorage, AK. Bethany Marcum, State Director, approves this message.