SMMEF donates 2.5 million

Amidst all the back-to-school buzz, on Wednesday, Aug. 30, the Santa Monica Malibu Education Foundation (SMMEF) announced that they had donated 2.48 million dollars to the SMMUSD district for the upcoming 2017-18 school year.SMMEF P.R. Representative and Executive Director, Linda Greenberg, announced the annual multi-million grant at their monthly board meeting. The funds will be distributed amongst all 16 SMMUSD public schools, on a school census basis for financial divvying, to support arts programs. Curriculum such as ballroom dancing for fifth graders and recorders for third graders.SMMEF is a Santa Monica-based foundation whose goal is to support arts and various other programs in our schools. SMMEF was founded by parents, community leaders and local business owners in 1982 in response to devastating budget cuts in the 80s. With a goal of enhancing and supplementing the SMMUSD curriculum, SMMEF’s fundraising is what makes many programs possible in the district.The Ed foundation donates millions to SMMUSD yearly, and has for the past 35 years. Despite grossing around an average of $250,000 annually in the beginning, the Ed foundation now raises north of two million dollars every year for our district.The $2.48 million donation is a conglomeration of all SMMEF fundraising from the prior school year. 2.01 million dollars of the donation were generated from Ed foundation events, like their annual wine auction. The other $470,000+ come from private endowments from people like sponsors or alumni.Being a public school with a census of around 3,500, even a sixteenth of the grant would mean a lot for Samo. The funds, when donated, are broken up into stretch grants, donations for which amounts are predetermined for each school based on population (the more students, the more money). For this 2017-18 school year, Samo was granted $75,783 in funds. This  grant will be used to support and prolong programs like Avid, theatre, visual arts (photography/painting/drawing), Restorative Justice and Naviance.“Funds that are raised through SMMEF are vital for our district in order to make progress on our ‘Excellence through Equity’ initiative while giving school sites the resources they desperately need as well as some flexibility in making decisions about how to spend them,” SMMUSD Board Member Jon Kean said. However, amid all happiness, one question remains. How will the possible Malibu-Santa Monica split affect the donation?“As of now, there's no split. We’re still one district, so for these funds there's no impact… the latest is that Malibu has petitioned the LA county office of education and they have to do their own examination and if they decide that they are in favor of it, then it has to go to the state. So there are still processes left,” SMMEF Communications Director Ann Conkle said.However according to SMMUSD Board Member Craig Foster, splitting from Malibu will actually increase the revenue of Santa Monica schools. “...Since Santa Monica subsidizes Malibu and SMMEF fundraising now, Santa Monica gives more than it’s proportional share,” Foster said.Despite the conflicts and complications with the district and admin, the importance is in the educational growth the Ed foundation funds.“The impact is incredible. It means that every student, no matter what school they’re at, gets to have amazing programs as a part of their education that are not covered by the money from the state or other government sources. It's such a tremendous opportunity for our students to have these programs that are funded by donations. The impact is so gratifying as someone who works at the Ed foundation, and raises the money, to see the impact on kids,” Conkle said.