Anchorage Daily News

The fledgling Alaska Native charter school has found a home and will begin classes next month.

Organizers had hoped to start teaching last year, but couldn't find the right place to put students. That changed in May when the school signed a lease to replace a furniture store near where Muldoon Road meets the Glenn Highway.

The plan is to teach kids Native culture in hands-on, Native ways.

There's room for 200 kids in grades kindergarten through sixth, and roughly that many have already signed up, said principal Tim Godfrey.

Applications are due Aug. 7, with students selected by a lottery, said school district spokeswoman Heidi Embley.

As for what students will learn, Godfrey said, for example, that kids might prepare for a berry picking trip by learning about the science of soils and plants.

"We're going to have Alaska Native elders in our building, hopefully at all times," he said, adding students will study Native languages, history and arts.

Asked if students will be ready to jump into regular district schools when they hit seventh grade, Godfrey said the charter school will teach and test kids to make sure they're keeping up with other students at their grade level.

Most of the applicants to the charter school so far are Alaska Native, he said, but anyone can attend.

Classes start Aug. 20 and will begin in a DeBarr Road church until renovations to the Ashley Furniture HomeStore are finished this winter, said Sheila Sweetsir, president of the school's academic policy committee.

For now, long yellow banners hang from the gray face of the two-story Ashley store: "Going out of Business." The building sits between a Domino's Pizza and a pawnshop called Cash America advertising "payday advance" on its walls.

A storm of cottonwood seeds floated across the parking lot one recent afternoon as a motorcycle rumbled down Muldoon. Inside the store, young couples browsed the couches and love seats.

"EVERYTHING MUST GO" signs hung from the ceiling.

Godfrey -- who was hired in March after spending the past two years in Eagle River as a special education teacher -- walked into the building for the first time. The store is more than 31,000 square feet, he said, and the physical school will be the largest of the city's eight charter schools.

Godfrey looked to a corner of the store, filled with a bedroom set. That's where the library's going, he said.

Charter schools are part of the larger school district but have more control over their budgets and are allowed to switch up how they teach and try new things. For example, one school teaches kids to speak German as they learn other subjects.

Enrollment is free. Funding comes from state and local taxes, but the schools try to get donations too.

There won't be any bus service, and the school plans to rely on car-pooling parents and volunteers.

One hurdle for rural students who move to Anchorage is that they might go from being in a school with just a few other children in their class to finding themselves sitting among dozens of strangers, Godfrey said.

"They're thrown into the shark tank and they're eaten alive."

The charter school will cap each class size at 20 kids.

Find Kyle Hopkins' political blog online at adn.com/alaskapolitics or call him at 257-4334.

Alaska Native Cultural Charter School:

www.asdk12.org/schools/anccs/pages/index.html

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