🐻 The Dragon’s Apprentice: How Governor Dunleavy is Sabotaging Alaska’s Schools

 

“We’re not going to stop pushing for better Alaska student outcomes.”

—Governor Mike Dunleavy, July 15, 2025

He says it like a promise. But in practice, it sounds more like a threat.

This summer, Governor Mike Dunleavy issued a glossy blog post celebrating “student success” and “parental choice.” He praised charter schools and homeschool allotments. He applauded the Alaska Supreme Court’s ruling that upheld public funds going directly to families in correspondence programs.

But what the post didn’t mention was what came just weeks before: $51 million slashed from Alaska’s public school funding. That’s more than $200 per student, ripped from district budgets after they were finalized. Schools were left scrambling—facing layoffs, bigger class sizes, deferred repairs, and the looming specter of rural school closures.

This isn’t reform.

This is sabotage.

📉 The Cut Heard ’Round the State

In February, communities across Alaska—conservative, progressive, rural, urban—rallied behind HB 57, a bipartisan education bill that increased the Base Student Allocation (BSA) by $680. It also addressed phone use in classrooms, supported charter collaboration, and built on early literacy successes. The Legislature passed it with near-unanimity.

And then the Governor vetoed it. Entirely.

“It’s outrageous. It’s an insult to our teachers, our students, and our local governments.”

—Carl Jacobs, Anchorage School Board

The Legislature overrode him in a rare bipartisan stand. But Dunleavy retaliated with a line-item veto, carving out $51 million anyway.

“What is the future of education in Alaska if we have to fight for basic funding every single year?”

—Scott Ballard, Superintendent, Yupiit School District

🧩 Reform Without Resources Is Just a Talking Point

Governor Dunleavy points to the Alaska Reads Act, which raised early literacy from 41% to 57% over two years, as evidence of his leadership.

But even the strongest curriculum needs boots on the ground.

What happens when a kindergarten teacher has 28 students and no aide?

What happens when literacy coaches are laid off to patch heating bills?

What happens when the people doing the work are too exhausted, underpaid, or gone?

You can’t build a house if you keep stealing the nails.

🎭 Puppet Strings & Private Profits

Dunleavy is not acting alone. His approach echoes a national blueprint crafted not for children—but for corporations.

He’s performing a familiar script authored by DC think tanks, textbook publishers, and the school privatization lobby. These groups have long sought to turn public education into a revenue stream—especially as open-source learning (like OpenStax) threatens the profits of companies like Pearson and McGraw-Hill.

“School privatization reshapes education into a consumer product, not a public good.”

—Derek W. Black, law professor, Schoolhouse Burning

By promoting voucher-like allotments, expanding charter pathways, and redirecting public dollars to private hands, Dunleavy advances the ALEC-aligned, DeVos-approved vision of “choice” that weakens public schools and strengthens corporate footholds.

And he is paid handsomely to do it—$2.8 million in campaign support, much of it from deregulation interests.

“The logic of profit is not the logic of care. It’s not the logic of democracy.”

—Heather McGhee, The Sum of Us

🐉 Dunleavy and the Dragon Overlords

In Alaska’s version of this story, the Governor doesn’t wield the sword.

He is the sword.

The real power belongs to the dragons:

🔥 One named Private Profit

🔥 One named DC Politics

They swoop down from their towers, setting fire to schoolhouses, devouring budgets, and demanding outcomes their own systems prevent. They care nothing for kids. They feast on contracts, testing regimes, and privatized curriculum packages.

And Dunleavy? He’s the steward at the gate, unlatching the doors from inside.

📊 Voucher States Show What Comes Next

We know how this ends because we’ve seen it before:

• Louisiana: Voucher students lost ground academically, with performance dropping the equivalent of a year’s worth of learning.
  
  
• Indiana: Test scores dropped and segregation increased.
  
  
• Ohio: Public schools lost funding while voucher results flatlined.
  
  
• Florida: Minor gains—but only where public schools competed under pressure, not because vouchers worked.
  
  

“Voucher programs … have some of the worst results in the history of education research—on par or worse than what COVID‑19 did to test scores.”

—Josh Cowen, education researcher

And now Arkansas and Arizona face budget crises fueled by unregulated ESA growth—bleeding public systems dry.

Alaska, beware.

🏚️ The For-Profit Prison Parallel

We’ve seen this logic before—in the rise of private prisons.

When CoreCivic and GEO Group promised “cost-effective” incarceration, the results were horrifying:

• Mass incarceration
  
  
• Longer sentences
  
  
• High recidivism
  
  
• Devastated families
  
  
• Profit-driven punishment
  
  

It was never about justice. It was about revenue.

Education is now on that same conveyor belt—standardized, privatized, and monetized.

Just like for-profit prisons, for-profit schooling removes local control, cuts corners, and turns children into metrics.

🧭 Brown Bear’s Bottom Line

Governor Dunleavy may say he’s “fighting for student outcomes.”

But the battlefield is littered with empty classrooms, overwhelmed teachers, and burned-out communities.

What he’s really fighting for is a future where Alaska’s public schools are relics—replaced by voucher vendors, online modules, and corporate charter franchises.

But we’re not going to let that happen.

Because in this story, the dragons don’t get the last word.

The people do.

🔥 Call to Action

☎️ Call your local superintendent and school board.  Ask how you can support your public schools.

👉 Share this post

📝 Email your lawmakers.

📞 Call the Governor’s Office: (907) 465‑3500

📣 Contact Deena Bishop, Commissioner of Education: 907-631-2679

💬 Talk to your neighbors. Especially the ones who vote.

We believe in Alaska’s kids.

We believe in our schools.

And we are not going to stop pushing back until every child has the opportunity to thrive.