Mat-Su Borough School Superintendent Monica Goyette: Part II of our conversation

Dr. Monica Goyette was named Mat-Su Valley School District Superintendent in April of 2017. That summer there was an initiative put forward for a 3 percent sales tax that would have been used for school funding. It never moved forward after a contentious Mat-Su Borough Assembly meeting that August. The part of that process that will always stick with me will be that meeting. What I will always remember is that the room was packed, and during the public input period it got ugly in a hurry. Goyette and her team sat there quietly and listened to insult after insult. Folks weren’t happy about the proposed tax, but the attacks on the work the school district was doing was grossly over-exaggerated. Like a prizefighter against the ropes taking body blow after body blow, Goyette like a professional, looked at each speaker and absorbed the punishment.

Reflecting back on that meeting I found Goyette’s response to the criticism interesting.

“This was about revenue and it was different to listen to people’s concerns about that and how it would affect them economically. What I learned and what came out of the sales tax committee was that we need to focus on what our expense side of the house is. Really it is the assembly’s responsibility to fund schools. Out of that came the ordinance for the five-year forward funding. We are really pleased with that,” Goyette said.

How does public comments that go to the point of criticizing the work that the school district does affect you and your staff in regards to moral?

“It’s my job to buffer the staff from that stuff as much as possible. It wasn’t fun. I take it as part of the job. The board had passed a resolution and I inherited that from the previous superintendent. We made the best presentation we could. You try not to take it personal. They don’t know me personally. I was new in the role and people didn’t know what I believed about education. I think it’s our job to bend to the will of the community. What I really took away from that is people find additional taxes as a hardship. I know there are things we can do internally to do a better job of spending money. That’s why we contracted with Government Finance Officers Association. We picked three areas to look at instruction, special education and administration. In the last decade we have spent more money on special education than on instruction so we asked them to do a deep dive into that as well. We asked them to look into federal programs. Federal programs would be money that is outside of our general operation budget that has a lot of strings attached to it. But it’s a lot of money, it’s around $17 million. We really want to look at how we can spend that money better. We’re looking at how to get it into the classroom. This month we will be going into a deeper dive into our central office. Even though the borough meeting was emotional there is a message there to be taken away,” Goyette said.

My ears perk up when schools talk about special education funding. I have first hand experience on how important the special education program is to children who are in need. Our youngest son came up through the special education program and the result has been amazing. Is the Mat-Su School District looking at cutting back on special education funding?

“No. Not only do we have a legal obligation, we have to do maintenance of effort from one year to the next. We have a moral obligation that we meet the needs of all kids. What is right to do for all kids doesn’t always mean equal. Equity is not equal. What we found though is that we have a lot more kids with behavioral needs than we had in the past. Our kids with learning disabilities, reading, writing and math has gone done about 25 percent in the last five years. We are seeing a big increase in autism and big increase in students that need behavioral support. We want to analyze and make sure that… when we decrease instruction we increase the number of kids in classrooms. Are we having more trouble in classrooms because we’re having to put more kids in and if we had a lower per-teacher-ratio is there a chance we could be solving some of those problems in the classroom. We just want to make sure that we’re not moving from a preventative to a response format. That’s the question I would like answered,” Goyette said.

What is the impact of the borough forward funding for the next five years and the state forward funding for one year?

“We’re growing still, so that’s the better side to be on even though it’s slow growth. Because of the growth we did not have to issue pink slips to our folks. I believe it’s a combination of forward funding and getting leaner on our expenditures in house. Our PTR was lower this year than it was last year with rising cost so we are really proud of that,” Goyette said.

Last spring the school board past a resolution for a certificate of participation in terms of purchasing buildings for the school district. What exactly is the goal with the COP?

“We spend approximately $1.8 million per year in leases and over the life of a long-term lease which can be ten years we can pay for a building. For instance, the Mat-Su Central building has been quoted for sale at $6 million and we spend $600,000 a year on the lease of the building. If we are there for thirty years we have bought the building three times over. We approached the borough about debt instruments that could help turn lease into ownership. For ten or twenty years-the life of that loan- there wouldn’t be any relief, but in the future, there could be. This was a recommendation by GFOA. COP’s was a mechanism that the borough had used in the past. It wouldn’t be any moneys that the voters would be putting up. It would be in our existing operating budget. So, we moved forward on a proposal on that. What we are finding as we go through the process is that voters are very suspicious of that. They feel like we are trying to do something that they should have an approval on. We are going to have a work session with our board to discuss legislative and assembly priorities. I don’t want to lose trust from our community. These are existing programs in buildings that students are going to. For me it’s a simple question. Is it better to own or to rent? I think most people would say it’s better to own. I’m getting the sense that our voters believe this is something that should be voted on,” Goyette said.

What schools would be affected and what happens if the programs in those schools were to go away due to lack of interest?

“We’re looking at two charter schools, Birch Tree and Midnight Sun. They have been long-standing schools in our valley. Both schools are at the beginning of a 10-year approval from the state and the school board. American Charter is another one. They have grown and would like to look at a building that would be more suited. We’re looking at a bus barn. The last time we went out for bid we only had one bidder. To get a competitive bid and a better rate on our bids we think that if we owned land and had a facility for our bus barn that would be something that would encourage competition. And Mat-Su Central, and that has tremendously grown. We have out grown the space,” Goyette said. “If for some reason one of the charter schools would not maintain enrollment we would just enroll it as a traditional brick and mortar school. We have schools that are over capacity now so we would redo boundaries and make it a traditional school.

“I love that we have co-enrolled programs. When people talk about choice across the nation the conversation is about either public schools or a voucher system. I really feel we are a model that you can do anything. Parents can have a choice and go anywhere they want. You can go to multiple schools.”

Goyette doesn’t have to look any further than her own father for inspiration and her love of education.

“I genuinely have a huge passion for education. My dad was born in 1938 in a Polish village. He was an only child. My grandfather went to fight in the war. My grandmother was left to keep my father alive. When he was 2 they escaped into Hungary and eventually made their way back. They lived in this war-torn country for seven years until he was 9. His village no longer exists. It was obliterated. They made their way to the train system. They were refugees and made it into England. The train after them… the gentlemen that was helping people escape was stopped by the Nazis. Everyone was murdered. They lived in England for four years. My grandmother was a maid and lived in someone’s house. My father had access to very poor-quality schools but he did learn English. Then they came to America when he was 13. That was when he entered into public education. He had five years. He was lucky. That was the only asset that my grandparents and my father had was education and hope for a better future. He graduated from high school, he went to Cal-Poly Technical. He got his bachelors in mechanical engineering. I tell people that public education wasn’t developed for the upper middle class and the upper class. They were already making sure their kids were getting great educations. Public education is lifting people up out of poverty. If my father can in five years of formal education attain what he attained…we have kids for 13 years. We can change their lives,” Goyette said.

“It’s worth doing the tough stuff. It’s worth getting out there and fighting for revenue. It’s worth all of that because I believe what we are doing is great. We were the highest achieving out of the five large districts on the state assessment in literacy and math. We’ve gone up 13 percent in the last six years in our graduation rates. Even though in the political arena there has been a lot of controversy. What’s happening in our schools and our staff…it’s so strong. The good out-weighs the negative.”