Senate Bill 277 puts target on Alaska charter schools and homeschool programs

By SUZANNE DOWNING

March 15, 2026 – Senate Bill 277 introduced in the Alaska State Legislature would threaten charter schools, upend Alaska’s correspondence programs, and redirect funding toward traditional school districts.

The bill, coauthored by Democrat Sen. Löki Tobin and Wasilla Sen. Rob Yundt through the Senate Education Committee, was read across the Senate floor last week and referred to the Senate Education and Finance committees. At more than 20 sections long, SB 277 rewrites multiple pieces of Alaska’s education funding formula, while increasing the Base Student Allocation and transportation funding.

Invited and public testimony will be taken March 18 in the Senate Education Committee.

The bill’s most consequential provisions target Alaska’s charter schools and the statewide correspondence programs that serve thousands of homeschool families.

Given Gov. Mike Dunleavy‘s history of supporting public school choice, including charter schools and correspondence program programs, it’s difficult to believe he would agree to a bill that could end up harming both programs.

One major change would allow school districts to take a larger share of charter school funding.

Current law allows districts to retain up to 4% of a charter school’s budget for administrative services. SB 277 would raise that cap to 8%.

Charter school budgets are based largely on student enrollment. Doubling the allowable administrative fee would reduce the amount of funding available to the charter school itself, effectively shifting more money to the district that oversees it.

That move could weaken independent charter programs by siphoning off operating funds.

The bill also rewrites how Alaska funds correspondence study programs, often used by homeschooling families.

Currently, correspondence students count as 90% of a full student under Alaska’s Average Daily Membership formula. SB 277 would increase that factor to 100%, counting correspondence students as full students.

However, another provision would significantly change how those students are assigned to districts for funding purposes.

Under SB 277, correspondence students would be counted by the school district in which they live, rather than the district operating the program.

That change could dramatically affect statewide programs operated by smaller districts, such as those run by the Galena City School District and other rural systems.

For example, Galena operates a large statewide correspondence program that enrolls thousands of students outside the community. If the bill becomes law, funding for those students would instead flow to the districts where the students reside.

That could dismantle the financial model that allows rural districts to run statewide homeschool programs.

The change could also produce unusual funding outcomes. In one example cited in legislative materials, thousands of correspondence students living in the Fairbanks North Star Borough School District could be counted toward the district’s smallest school for formula purposes, potentially inflating that school’s calculated enrollment dramatically.

One provision likely to be popular with homeschool families would allow students to keep educational materials purchased through correspondence allotments even after leaving a program.

Currently, materials purchased through state correspondence funding must generally be returned when a student leaves.

SB 277 also includes several statewide funding adjustments:

• Base Student Allocation increase: The bill raises the BSA by $126.54, bringing it from $6,660 to $6,786.54 per student.

• Transportation funding: The per-student transportation formula would increase by roughly 6.6%.

• Reading grants: The bill removes language making reading proficiency incentive grants subject to annual appropriation, potentially expanding spending automatically.

Because the BSA interacts with multiple multipliers in Alaska’s foundation formula, even a relatively small increase can compound into a much larger cost statewide.

Legislative estimates suggest the BSA increase alone could add more than $31 million to education spending.

Already there is an attempt to raise the per-pupil funding. House Bill 374 would raise the Base Student Allocation from $6,660 to $7,290 beginning July 1. Before last year’s hike, the formula was $5,960, although lawmakers always awarded more each year in the appropriation process.

House Bill proposes yet another boost to Alaska school funding after last year’s record increase

The bill also makes several structural changes to education policy.

It updates teacher certification language to allow degrees accredited by institutional accrediting associations, reflecting recent federal changes to how accreditation is recognized.

Another section would apply the same reemployment restrictions used for retired teachers to retired staff working at regional resource centers.

SB 277 also requires the Legislative Budget and Audit Committee to commission a comprehensive study of Alaska’s education funding system, to be completed by January 1, 2027 in collaboration with the Institute of Social and Economic Research.

The study would examine alternative funding formulas, geographic cost factors, and possible mechanisms for state and local contributions.

The question now becomes whether there is the need for another study when Alaska lawmakers recently created a task force to examine education funding.

With thousands of students enrolled in statewide correspondence programs such as IDEA Homeschool and Raven Homeschool, changes to how those students are counted could ripple through both rural and urban school districts.

Alaska has the most unique and liberal homeschool laws in the country. This may be the first attempt to eliminate that freedom of choice in education that Alaska has enjoyed for many years by those on the far left who want Alaska to adopt educational policy more akin to Illinois and California.