The latest step in the school district split between Santa Monica and Malibu is to procure the public’s opinion on the full unification package between the two entities.
On Tuesday at 5:30pm, the Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District (SMMUSD) will hold a special Board of Education meeting discussing unification agreements between SMMUSD and City of Malibu. The two entities announced on September 12 that their respective subcommittees agreed on a proposed school separation package, consisting of a Revenue Sharing Agreement, an Operational Transfer Agreement and a Joint Powers Agreement.
All three agreements, along with their executive summaries, were posted on the SMMUSD Board of Education webpage with the Tuesday meeting agenda. The public previously heard the revenue sharing agreement, the first of the three agreements to be finalized, in two public hearings. Both Santa Monica and Malibu hosted meetings for the revenue sharing portion.
At the last regularly-scheduled Board of Education meeting on October 10, the board heard an update on the district’s Expanded Learning Opportunities Program (ELOP). Born from Assembly Bill 130 in the California Legislature, ELOP provides enrichment opportunities for unduplicated students in grades TK-6.
The definition of an unduplicated pupil, per the California Department of Education, is a student who qualifies for free or reduced lunch, is homeless, a foster youth or an English Learner. ELOP programs operate for 180 school days, plus 30 intercession days, and serves students through community partnerships.
“It is not just the school district trying to do this on our own, but rather we bring in the people who know our families and our students best, all the people who surround our community,” said SMMUSD Director of Early Learning Dr. Susan Samarge-Powell.
These partnerships begin with the Boys & Girls Clubs in Santa Monica and Malibu for enrichment time outside of school hours, and also extend to organizations aligning with Career Technical Education pathways in the district. Partnerships impact pathways such as engineering (with Rediscover), arts, media and entertainment (with Theatre Thirty One), information and computer technology (with PlanetBravo) and health and wellness (via SMMUSD middle school sports).
Counting one child attending one day of ELOP programs as an “attendance unit,” the district counted 32,249 total attendance units across TK-6 in the 2023-24 year. Consultant Ian Keiller noted that these programs can build healthy habits for unduplicated pupils within school hours as well.
“We know that kids that attend after-school programs attend school more, we know that they do better, we know that they have better grades,” Keiller said.
In his report to the board, SMMUSD Superintendent Dr. Antonio Shelton noted that the district will once again be participating in the Great California ShakeOut earthquake preparedness drill on Thursday.
Taking place at 10:17am, the annual drill sees students practice the “drop, cover, hold on” steps in class settings to protect them from earthquake-related injuries. The “drop” step has students falling onto hands and knees to lower chances of being knocked down by an earthquake and being hit by falling or flying objects.
thomas@smdp.com
