College student Kevin Allen will make a third attempt to win a seat on the Juneau School Board in the Oct. 2 municipal election.
Allen, 20, graduated from Thunder Mountain High School in 2016. He previously served as a student representative to the school board during his senior year.
He ran unsuccessfully for the board in the last two municipal elections, but said he decided to run again after realizing this year’s race would be different.
“I realized there’s no one else signing on right now, and I thought, ‘Well jeez, this is going to be a very transformational year.’ There’s no incumbents running and there’s going to be three brand new faces on that board.”
Board member Emil Mackey recently announced his plan to run for Juneau Assembly. Incumbents Andi Story and Josh Keaton are also not running for re-election. Story is focusing on her run for the Alaska House of Representatives. That leaves three seats open on the seven-member board.
Two other candidates, Paul Kelly and Elizabeth Siddon, have also filed to run for school board.
Allen is currently studying accounting part-time at the University of Alaska Southeast. He serves as president of the Alaska Native Sisterhood Glacier Valley Camp 70 and on the community council for the Central Council Tlingit & Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska.
He said he admires the board for its style of debate and discussion, and hopes to learn about how to approach complex issues.
“They’re really just listening carefully and intentionally to who they may disagree with and try their best to understand where they’re coming from. I noticed that when I was a student rep in 2016, and I just want to keep that up.”
Allen hopes to focus on more collaboration with the statewide Alaska Association of School Boards, responsible spending on technology education and attendance issues, among other things.
The deadline to file for Juneau’s local election was 4:30 p.m. Monday.
