As expected, the battle has resumed over whether Alaska’s growing homeschool population can utilize state-funded correspondence programs to access educational goods and services provided at private and religious entities.

Last summer, the Alaska Supreme Court rejected a challenge to this practice that was spearheaded by the powerful NEA-Alaska teachers union. While the high court’s June 2024 decision in favor of the state preserved the status quo and gave homeschool families and schools a level of stability during the current school year, all parties knew the battle was far from over.

Last week, plaintiffs renewed the battle with a modified case filed in Anchorage District Court. The case now names four school districts, claiming they approved unconstitutional uses of the homeschool funds. The named districts are Anchorage, Mat-Su, Denali Borough and Galena City.

Now that the case has been refiled, a high-stakes battle over the future of the state’s homeschool allotment program is set to play out, with the educational future of roughly 23,000 children at stake.

In issuing their decision last July, the Alaska Supreme Court rejected a lower court opinion that claimed the entire homeschool allotment program should be discarded because some families use the allotments to provide their children with educational opportunities provided by private and religious schools.

That lower-court finding was based on the belief that it was unconstitutional to spend public funds at private or religious educational intuitions or organizations, since the Alaska Constitution forbids the use of public funds to “directly benefit” these entities.

Attorney Kirby West, arguing on behalf of homeschool families, made the case that the allotments only “indirectly” benefited private and religious schools, since the money is given to the parents, who could have spent the funds in myriad ways. The fact that some money was spent on private schools only provides an indirect benefit to these institutions, she maintained. She compared it to parents who might choose to spend some of their Permanent Fund Dividend dollars this way.

While the Supreme Court declined to rule on the constitutionality of using the allotments in this manner, it did declare that the lower court was wrong to strike down the allotment program in its entirety based on the belief that some applications might be unconstitutional.

Additionally, the high court noted that all parties seem to agree that homeschool funds could be used on private martial arts classes, gym memberships and pottery courses, and myriad other costs associated with private businesses.

The court declined, however, to rule on the more fundamental question of whether the Alaska Constitution permits spending allotment funds at private or religious educational institutions – a question both homeschool families and the plaintiffs want resolved.

Ultimately, the Alaska Supreme Court declined to rule on whether individual school districts were approving specific instances of unconstitutional uses of the allotments, because the plaintiffs had failed to name any districts as defendants in the initial lawsuit.

The court said it cannot rule against a party that is not even involved in the lawsuit, and remanded the case back to the superior court, saying that the question of whether school districts can approve allotment reimbursement funds for money spent at private or religious schools must first be argued in the lower court.

Now that the case has been refiled, a high-stakes battle over the future of the state’s homeschool allotment program is set to play out, with the educational fate of roughly 23,000 children at stake. The current school year is not affected.

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