School board approves 10-year extension, charter school continues to grow

JOEL DAVIDSON/Frontiersman reporter

MAT-SU -- The Mat-Su Borough School Board recently approved a 10-year extension to the charter of Midnight Sun Family Learning Center.

The board voted unanimously at its last regularly scheduled meeting to continue the 7-year-old charter school. The process now goes before the State Board of Education, which is expected to make a final decision in March 2005.

Jeanne Troshynski has taught at the school since its inception and is confident the state will agree to the extension.

"We've been told by the state that, along with Academy Charter, we are considered one of the top charter schools in the state," Troshynski said. "Parents want their kids here."

The approval from the Mat-Su School Board is one of many bright spots for the school in recent months.

On Nov. 12, the school moved out of the B & J Rainbow Center, a strip-mall across from the Borealis Beach Club, and into new quarters about a mile down Pittman Road. The bright-yellow and purple building now comfortably holds 166 students, grades K-8.

Troshynski said the new facility, equipped with larger classrooms, a teacher lounge and a new gymnasium, is much better suited for a school than the old strip-mall site.

Since 1997, the school has gradually grown from a grass-roots effort by local teachers and parents at Big Lake Elementary School to a legitimate school of seven teachers and nine federally "highly qualified" support staff.

Troshynski said teachers and parents first considered the idea of starting a charter school after state Sen. Lyda Green, R-Mat-Su, spoke at Big Lake Elementary and encouraged the founding of a charter school based on multi-age learning.

Nina Brady, who now teaches at Midnight Sun Family Learning Center, was a teacher at Big Lake Elementary when Green first mentioned the idea. Brady taught a multi-aged class at the time and now teaches grades 2-8, all in one class.

Brady said multi-aged classrooms provide a continuity between teachers and their students. She has taught some students for seven consecutive years.

Troshynski said the continuity builds a bond between teachers and students.

"The longer a student stays with a teacher, the larger the growth gains," she said. "Teachers get to know the students, their needs and how they best learn."

Contact Joel Davidson at joel.davidson@frontiersman.com.