As we welcome students, families, and staff to the 2025–2026 school year at Apache Junction Unified School District, I want to share a message that has been on my mind: this year feels different.

In fact, I believe this might be the year everything changes.

Not because we are planning some grand overhaul, but because the world around us isn’t waiting for us to catch up.

Arizona has committed over $1 billion to school choice, opening more options for private and home education — with little accountability or transparency attached. At the same time, AI technology is no longer a distant innovation. It is advancing at an astonishing pace, reshaping how we work, learn, and live.

Meanwhile, public education, by and large, still looks the same as it did 125 years ago.

That gap — between massive change happening everywhere else and minimal change inside our classrooms — puts us at a real crossroads. But in that challenge, I see opportunity.

This is our moment to lead.

We have the chance to show our students, families, and community that public education can evolve, stay relevant, and remain the foundation of a healthy democracy. As Thomas Jefferson said, “An educated citizenry is a vital requisite for our survival as a free people.” We cannot afford a generation left behind.

So what will this look like in AJUSD this year?

• We will focus on personalized learning, meeting each student where they are and giving them what they need, when they need it.

• We will treat families as true partners, not just recipients of report cards or school notices.

• We will hold onto what makes education meaningful: the human connection, while being willing to try new approaches that help every student succeed.

• We will rethink how we define success, how we measure growth, and how we prepare students for a world that is moving faster than ever.

This work will not be easy. It will take courage, creativity, and collaboration across our district. But we cannot afford to stand on the sidelines while everything changes around us.

We need to be the ones shaping the change.

This is our chance to show our community, our state, and our country that public schools are not just worth defending, they are worth transforming.

I am honored to do this work alongside you. Let’s make this the year we look back on and say: That’s when everything changed, and we made it happen.

Dr. Robert Pappalardo
Superintendent, Apache Junction Schools