The Aleutians East Borough, the Aleutian Region, and the Pribilof School Districts are all seeking waivers that would allow them to allocate less than 70 percent of their budgets to instruction-related costs.

The state has 54 school districts, and 23 of them are looking for relief from the Alaska Board of Education's “70-30 rule.” If they exceed the 30-percent budgetary threshold, districts must show that non-instructional expenditures are beyond their control.

Tim Stathis, the superintendent of the Aleutians East Borough School District, says that the original intent of the requirement was to provide some budgetary limits on schools so they wouldn’t mismanage state funds.

“The purpose was to make sure [schools] weren’t simply building lavish buildings that had high maintenance costs, or were taking extensive travel trips to the far-off places of the world and justifying it in their accounts, and so forth,” says Stathis. “It was supposed to give some kind of measure of accountability.”

But in rural areas, maintenance expenses -- like heating fuel and electricity -- can eat up well over a third of a school’s budget. Stathis adds there’s also a Catch-22 of school size often not matching student enrollment. For example, he says a school may have originally been built for a hundred kids but you still need to heat the whole building even if just a dozen students are in attendance. On top of that, lower enrollment levels also mean less funding from the state because schools get a certain amount of money for each student.

The Unalaska City School District does not need to apply for one of these waivers, says superintendent John Conwell.

The applications will be considered next week. While requests are rarely denied, the Board of Education did reject the Yupiit School District’s application last year. The state initially asked YSD to return more than $700,000 in state funding, but then agreed to a settlement where the district would spend $300,000 on outside financial reviews.

Michael Hanley, the state education commissioner, has recommended all waivers be approved this year.