OPINION: ‘Happy 40th, Bear Valley — now go away’

In the quiet upper mountains of South Anchorage, Bear Valley Elementary, an award-winning school with a storied 40-year history, faces a bizarre and imminent threat: closure. This isn’t just the loss of a neighborhood elementary in a gorgeous location; it’s the start of systematic dismantling of a community cornerstone of the upper South Anchorage hillside. The school district’s proposal to shutter its doors is a direct assault on our kids and our community.

Under Superintendent Jharrett Bryantt’s direction, the Anchorage School District School Board is being tasked with a horrible and impossibly quick timeline to close and consolidate schools, apparently with their decision based upon information compiled by Western Demographics Inc., an outside company with a self-proclaimed specialization in “closure and consolidation,” and a suspect track record of skewed numbers and irrational conclusions. Here we go again. Outsiders making a pile of money off us to decide what is best for Alaskans.

None of the hard data behind this misguided decision to target Bear Valley for closure next year has been shared with concerned parents or the public. What little flawed reasoning that has been shared includes claims that the school is at 69% capacity, which is misleading because the school had a waitlist of 43 students at the beginning of this school year. Bear Valley’s recent loss of students was only due to the district removing the entire sixth grade from the school, and even that reduction is being mitigated with the introduction of a much-needed preschool program that will serve 20 students next year and upwards of 40 in the future. The proposed move to break up the Bear Valley students and send them to O’Malley, Huffman and Rabbit Creek will put those schools at 98%, 96% and 98% capacity, respectively, with their school drop-off parking insanity increased to a factor of, as the kids might say, “infinity plus one.”

In so many ways the closure appears both suspect and rushed, putting the Anchorage School Board in an untenable and unfair position with information they simply should not trust at face value. The closures and consolidations Superintendent Bryantt is proposing solve nothing and will only create a vicious cycle of decline, where each school becomes overburdened by the neighboring school that has been closed.

Whatever the game being played here, whether it’s numbers or looming budget shortfalls; the real argument should be about properly providing a decent education to all students. For Bear Valley, our school is the soul of our mountain community. We stand united to protect the future of the school and the students, the incredible teachers, and the dedicated staff. The district needs to reconsider this harmful decision and take a hard look at the entire process, including the methods and data used by Western Demographics Inc.

Bear Valley plays a unique role here; it is doubtful Dr. Bryantt or this outside company can understand or factor in just what this closure means to us. Bear Valley is more than just a school; it’s one of Upper Hillside’s only gathering places. It’s a school and a playground where children learn, grow, and dream; it’s also where we have our community council meetings, where we skate, vote, have summer school programs and hold community carnivals.

In September, we celebrated this storied institution where, for 40 years, friendships have been forged, children inspired and memories made. To close the doors to Bear Valley is to extinguish what has been a beacon of learning and growth for decades of Hillside families. Why end that? If they can turn the lights off at our only neighborhood elementary school, what will stop them from shutting down yours, too?

Don Rearden is a writer and Bear Valley Elementary parent. The author of the novel “The Raven’s Gift,” he lives and writes in Anchorage, but often pretends he’s still back somewhere on the tundra outside of Bethel.

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