Juneau was on the educational support staff of Browning, Montana schools from 1986 through 1988. She was a high school teacher in New Town, North Dakota, within the Fort Berthold Indian Reservation, from 1994 through 1995, and in Browning, Montana, from 1995 through 1997. Juneau was an instructional specialist at the Montana Office of Public Instruction under Superintendent Nancy Keenan from 1998 through 2001. While at the Montana Office of Public Instruction, Juneau served as Director of Indian Education, where she oversaw the implementation of Montana's constitutionally mandated Indian Education For All program. It was designed to deliver education in the public schools on Montana's American Indian heritage. Juneau was a law clerk at the Montana Supreme Court for justices Jim Regnier and Brian Morris from 2004 through 2005. She worked as an associate attorney for the law firm Monteau and Peebles from 2005 to 2006. From 2006 through 2008, she was a division administrator at the Office of Public Instruction under Superintendent Linda McCulloch. In 2009, Juneau was named Educator of the Year by the National Indian Education Association.
Political campaigns
In 2008, Juneau ran for Superintendent of Public Instruction. She won a four-way Democratic primary in June. In the November general election, the final vote tally was 234,483 for Juneau, 201,091 for her GOP opponent, Elaine Sollie Herman, and 24,236 for Libertarian candidate Donald Eisenmenger. She was the first American Indian woman to win a statewide office. In 2012, Juneau ran for re-election against Republican Sandy Welch. Juneau was narrowly re-elected, receiving 235,397 votes to Welch's 233,166 votes. Due to term limits, Juneau was ineligible to run again in 2016. Juneau was named as a possible candidate for US Senator Max Baucus's seat, which was vacated upon his retirement in 2014. On August 5, 2013, she announced that she would not run for the Senate. On November 4, 2015, Juneau announced her candidacy for Montana's lone seat in the U.S. House of Representatives. As of November 1, 2016, she ranked 6th in the country for congressional candidates raising money from donors giving $200 or less. Juneau was defeated by incumbent Republican Representative Ryan Zinke in the general election. Juneau won 40% of the vote.
Since Juneau took office in 2009, she reported that Montana's graduation rate increased 4.7 percent, while the dropout rate decreased 1.3 percent since the state had started tracking these numbers in 2000. Juneau oversaw the development of Montana's "Schools of Promise Initiative", an $11.5 million, three-year project which used federal grant money "to help teachers' union leaders, school board officials, and administrators attempt to address students' academic and social-emotional needs in some of the state's most disadvantaged schools." The academic results of that program have been mixed. Juneau gave a speech at the 2012 Democratic National Convention in which she praised U.S. President Barack Obama's education policy. In 2015, Juneau was awarded the Alumni Council Award for Outstanding Contributions to Education, from the Harvard Graduate School of Education. She also received the National Education Association's 2015 Leo Reano Memorial Award.
In April 2018, Seattle Public Schools board unanimously voted to elect Denise Juneau as the next superintendent of Seattle Public Schools. She began on July 1, 2018. In June 2019, Denise Juneau terminated Seattle Public Schools' partnership with the Urban Native Education Alliance, a community-based organization serving Native American youth. In March 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, and with Washington state's schools closed, she announced that Seattle Public Schools would not transition to online learning, for equity reasons.
Personal life
Juneau is an enrolled member of the federally recognized Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara Nation, also known as the Three Affiliated Tribes. She also has Blackfeet ancestry. She is openly gay and the first such candidate to run for federal office in Montana. In November 2015, Juneau confirmed she had twice been arrested while a college student for driving under the influence.
