Blazing their own path in Valley education

MAT-SU —Valley Pathways is one of the alternative high schools in the Mat-Su Borough School District. There are many aspects of Valley Pathways that make it alternative to the extreme sense of the word. Pathways students face incredible difficulties to maintain success in their education. But even though students face very different circumstances compared to those attending a traditional high school, success is still paramount.

“At a traditional high school, it was kind of sink or swim. At Valley Pathways, you have a more beneficial opportunity. You can graduate on time, but you have to want it. Kids here want it,” said Pathways senior Jessica Tremaine. Tremaine took a year at Palmer High School, then switched to Pathways.

Valley Pathways operates out of 12 portables. Students face an interview process to get in, having to convince administration that though they have not had success in a traditional high school, they believe they can achieve success at Valley Pathways.

Pathways class sizes are much smaller than that of a traditional high school. Individual attention is the focus for any student educating there.

Each student calls each adult by his or her first name, rather than “mr.” or “mrs.”

“I know every student personally at my school,” said Valley Pathways Principal Jim Wanser.

This individual attention afforded to each student has resulted in success that cannot be seen for Valley Pathways students when they were attending traditional schools.

“We have a former graduate who works for the Department of Defense in the pentagon. He essentially has the same clearance as the president,” said Wanser.

Pathways students attend because they want to learn, and they are successful. Pathways made annual yearly progress under the No Child Left Behind Act in consecutive years. Valley Pathways students are going from less than desirable educational status to graduating in their projected fourth years.

“Kids are coming from tough situations,” Tremaine said. “Some students are parents, some are coming from potentially abusive families, some are homeless, some have to take time out of the day to deal with issues.”

Even though these students are coming from situations far from conducive to an education, or maybe even just a situation where they weren’t passing classes in a traditional school, they’re going to Valley Pathways because they want to, and they’re succeeding at a normal rate.

“Valley Pathways has been open for 11 years, and there’s been virtually zero turnover in staff. Teachers who come here want to be here and they want to stay here. All of them are exceptional, like being here and do a great job with the kids,” Wanser said.

Each student has a counselor at the school — one of the teachers.

“Every student is assigned their adviser. Once they find their adviser they make a connection and it turns a 180,” Tremaine said. “At a traditional school, a teacher only has five minutes of a passing period to get to know you and listen to you. At Valley Pathways, teachers are more involved with the students and with each other.”

It’s not that teachers have found the secret to algebra and it’s being locked up inside the 12 portables of Valley Pathways, but teachers have the time, care and connection to find the weaknesses these students encountered with traditional school and make corrections.

“One particular student who came here loved it. It gave her security gave her a home. Her adviser became a mother figure. Not only was she able to graduate, she felt she had a home she belonged in,” Tremaine said.

Valley Pathways does not operate out of one state-of-the-art building with marvelous facilities for any benefit possible in education. Actually, the building situation is quite the opposite.

“At one period we didn’t have drinking water on campus, we don’t have a kitchen able to provide a full lunch, when some kids need it. Kids have to go outside to get from class to class,” Wanser said.

While the facility may not be something for Wanser to brag about, what’s coming out of those 12 portables is.

“The students are making a choice to come over to Valley Pathways,” Wanser said. “The conditions are horrendous, but they come. They love the school, the teachers, the culture. The facility doesn’t make the school, it’s the people who make the school.”

Tim Rockey is a senior at Palmer High School.