When the Anchorage School District voted to convert O’Malley Elementary into a French immersion school, Verena Gill said was under the impression that the change would not affect her family.
ANCHORAGE, Alaska - When the Anchorage School District voted to convert O’Malley Elementary into a French immersion school, Verena Gill said was under the impression that the change would not affect her family.
With no children in elementary school anymore, it seemed like the closures and boundary changes that came would only affect students at those schools. Gill’s daughter, Juniper, is in 6“I didn’t see anything that would impact us and dug around, looked at things, and then on Monday, I received an email, telling me that there could be changes, boundary changes,” Gill said. That email went out to families at Campbell STEM, O’Malley, Hanshew, and Service on March 16 — after the “rightsizing” decision was made — that said the following. “The Anchorage School District School Board recently voted to approve boundary changes that will take effect starting next school year. As a result, some neighborhoods in our community will be impacted by this decision.”“I want you to explain the options that you have,” the counselor said. “Option one is: remain at your current school with no district transportation. And option two is: attend your neighborhood school, which will be Golden View, with transportation provided.”Gill’s neighbors have an eighth-grade student at Hanshew and a student at Service High School, both wish to stay at their current schools. Ultimately, the eighth-grade student will have to go to South High School since she cannot be grandfathered into Service, meaning the family would need to adjust to having both kids at two different schools.The district said students can be grandfathered into their current schools, but without district-provided transportation. “I have a full time job and I’m the sole provider and transportation for my child. So I’m already impacted,” Gill said. “So how do I get impacted by not having a bus to Hanshew?”“You saw these windy, twisty, icy roads,” Gill said. “I’ve often sat at the bus stop on the corner there and moose have gone by, and I fear moose way more than I fear bears. But we have plenty of bears around here.” Gill said she does not feel comfortable with her daughter walking to school. She also noted the proximity of her home to Service High School. “I can see Service from my deck,” Gill said. “I can see Hanshew from my deck. It’s right there. It’s a couple of miles away.”ASD responded to questions about the messages, saying the message was shared earlier this week because students and staff returned from spring break, and are scheduling for next school year. The district also said it informed parents when the boundary changes were first discussed and approved. “The rightsizing decisions were informed by data analysis and community feedback,” a district spokesperson said in the email. “We conducted outreach through emails, reminders, and surveys in multiple languages including English, Samoan, Spanish, Russian, Ukrainian and Filipino as well as hosted community meetings at impacted schools to gather feedback and answer questions.” “The School Board also held several board meetings where it was discussed publicly and provided an opportunity for community feedback.”“I had not received any surveys or questionnaires or emails or anything prior to that talking about, uh, the possibility of students at Hanshew and Service being redistricted. And when I did finally get a hold of a map, it still was not clear that it included Hanshew and Service,” Gill said. The map in question included a diagram of where O’Malley students would be redistributed but did not include middle or high school students. “If you look at the materials they provided, it was not transparent,” Gill said. “In fact, I think they did a bait and switch. If you look at the materials, there is no indication that this was going to occur.” Gill’s next-door neighbor emailed School Board member Margo Bellamy prior to the boundary change decision in February, asking them if it would affect students heading into middle and high school. The response included no clear answer to the question. “The Board will deliberate and vote on a balanced FY 28 Budget during a Special School Board Meeting on February 24@7pm,” Bellamy wrote. While the “community conversations” and board meetings were open to the public, Gill said she wasn’t aware the decision might affect her as a middle school parent. Plus, Gill’s busy schedule often prevents her from making for time for lengthy meetings, she said. “Give us more time. Give us months of time to reflect, to think,” Gill said. “I have basically four hours from getting a phone call to realizing I better scoot over to the school board meeting and tell them what I think.”Beyond transportation, parents said the boundary changes could disrupt the school communities their children have built. “It is unsettling for children to do this. We saw what COVID did to children and now we’re going to do this,” Gill said.“I’ll miss a lot of things about Hanshew. I really do like it at Hanshew,” Juniper Gill said. “It’s really nice. I have all my friends there. I love the ski team and all the running teams that they have. And all the teachers and everybody there is just like really nice.” Gill’s older daughter, Brianna, already graduated from Service High School, and Juniper was hoping to follow in her footsteps. “I really do want to go to service, but then also it’s like, I won’t be able to take the bus, too,” Juniper Gill said. “So even if I do stay at Hanshew, I just won’t be able to take the bus, and normally a lot of the time I do actually take the bus, so…” At this point, neither Juniper nor Verena are quite sure what they’ll do, but the district told them they have until April 1 to decide.“I think they need to do due diligence with the public process,” Gill said. “Right now, I feel like they have taken the public out of public schools.”Sled dog dies on Iditarod trail en route to Elim checkpoint, officials say2026 Iditarod Live BlogAlaska Native Language Center will not close, Fairbanks university confirms
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