School board resolution would disavow best teacher and school in radio outlet’s ‘Best of Juneau’ survey

First-ever inclusion of such nominees ‘conflicts with the District’s core values of equity, collaboration, and collective responsibility for student success,’ JSD memo states

A map shows public schools and other education-related sites in Juneau. (Google Maps)

By Mark Sabbatini

Juneau Independent

People have cast their votes for Juneau’s best school and best teacher. A resolution before the Juneau School District on Tuesday seeks to disavow the results.

Categories for best school and teacher were included for the first time in the annual "Best of Juneau" survey conducted by a company that owns several local radio stations including KINY and TAKU 105. Voting in the online survey has closed and results are scheduled to be announced March 30.

"Several staff members and community members have expressed concern that ranking or singling out individual schools or teachers conflicts with the District’s core values of equity, collaboration, and collective responsibility for student success," a district administration memo to the school board states.

The resolution, if passed, would declare "that the Juneau School District Board of Education does not endorse the 2026 Best of Juneau categories for ‘Schools’ and ‘Teachers.’"

Elizabeth Siddon, the school board’s vice president, said in an interview Saturday the resolution is not seeking to repress the results of the survey.

"We're not suggesting the survey do anything," she said. "The survey will continue, the school will be announced, the teacher will be announced. The resolution doesn't say that the ‘Best of Juneau’ survey should do anything different."

School board president Britteny Cioni-Haywood, in an interview Saturday, said she doesn’t know yet how she’ll vote on the resolution.

"Particularly if we get public testimony either way then I want to hear what that is," she said. "Or, additionally, what other board members might have as pros and cons for this."

The teacher and school categories were added to this year’s "Best of Juneau" as part of a switch to managing the survey locally rather than via a third-party organization as in past years, Cliff Dumas, owner/operator of Alaska First Media, the current owner of the radio stations, in an interview Saturday.

"We built the entire platform in-house and (it was) managed by our people," he said. "And then part of that was like, ’OK, it's a way to celebrate local businesses and services and people — are there any categories that we've missed in the past that we should put on here?’ And somebody mentioned schools and teachers so we put it on for the nomination list. And the various schools and teachers got nominated, so we put them on the voting category."

About 80,000 votes were cast in this year’s survey, with people allowed to vote once per day, Dumas said. He said he is planning to attend the board meeting Tuesday to discuss the concerns raised.

"I would like to talk to the board, at least explain how it's done, why it's done, why we put the category in, and if the category should be adjusted or something for next year," he said. "But listen, at the end of the day I think we should celebrate every teacher on the planet."

Numerous Juneau School District employees have received official individual honors over the years. Among them, James White of Thunder Mountain Middle School was recently honored by the State of Alaska as the Hunter Educator of the Year. Two district teachers, Lorrie Gax̱.áan.sán Heagy and Yuxgitisiy George Holly, last October were among the recipients of the Governor’s Arts and Humanities Award. Paula Casperson of Juneau-Douglas High School: Yadaa.at Kalé was named the 2022 Regional Principal of the Year and former district head Bridget Weiss selected as Alaska’s superintendent of the year for 2022.

The difference between those awards from statewide entities and an online radio survey is the selectiveness of the process, Siddon said.

"Not all schools or all teachers are in there, it's only whoever was nominated from the community," Siddon said of the radio survey, adding "we don't even know who nominated those people."

• Contact Mark Sabbatini at editor@juneauindependent.com or (907) 957-2306.