Matt Potter filed to run for a seat on the Sitka School Board on Friday (8-7-26). Potter has worked as a school administrator and teacher across Alaska, including in the Sitka School District. He spoke with KCAW shortly after filing about his interest in serving on the board. Listen to the conversation here:
KCAW: You have thrown your hat in the ring for a seat on the Sitka School Board. You’re currently a member, you were appointed last month, but you’re vying for a full term. Why why are you running for a seat on the board?
Potter: I’ve decided to run for school board because I and my family have been in Sitka for almost 10 years now. I first came to Sitka as the assistant principal at Blatchley Middle School, and we’ve kind of made it our home. We’ve a couple times have had to leave because of job opportunities, and funding cuts in education, and that kind of stuff. But really, this is our home, and my kids or my boys are both at the age where one’s going to be in third grade, one’s going to start kindergarten next year. I want to be able to kind of shape the way that their education is as they move through the Sitka School District, and everything that I have seen, everything I’ve been a part of in Sitka, we have a really great educational system. We have awesome staff members, and awesome teachers, and I want to be able to be a part of that, and help shape as we’re going forward, especially with the the way funding in education on the state level has been trending in the last couple of years. I want to be able to make sure that I have a voice in how that money and how those budgets are made, but I also want to be able to have a platform for advocacy on that statewide level as well. So I think that being a part of the school board is really going to kind of help me do both of those things.
KCAW: And can you talk a little bit about what experiences you you have that are going to inform your work on the board the most?
Potter: I have been in education my whole adult life. I started as a teacher in Anchorage, and my first administrative job was up north of Fairbanks, and then after that, that’s when I moved to Sitka as the AP at Blatchley. I was then the the principal at Seward Middle School in Seward. I came back and I was at Mt. Edgecumbe for a couple years as an assistant principal there, and I spent the last year in Oregon as a director of a middle school director of a charter school down there. So I feel like coming onto the school board with a background in education, but also a background in education that’s not just with the Sitka School District, but it’s kind of statewide and in multiple states as well. [It] kind of gives me that overarching view of how the education system works, both the city level, the state level, but also kind of nationally as well. And I think that’ll kind of help me inform my decisions as as we move forward, especially with the budgeting process, because it’s always such a big issue for the school board and for the school district as a whole.
KCAW: Can you expand a little bit more on what your goals would be if you were elected to the board for a full term?
Potter: Yeah, and you know, I don’t have one specific goal that I have in mind. I just want to be able to serve the school district any way possible, and now it’s going to be on the school board and help inform the decisions that are made, so that that both my family, my sons, as well as the students in the Sitka School District as a whole get the best education that they can get. I mean, because really, at the end of the day, right, that’s why everybody is in education, is on the school board, is because we want what’s best for kids, and I think this is the way that I can help direct that.
