Donations are up at all schools, quelling parent fears
DISTRICT HDQRTRS. — A controversial plan that mandates 15 percent of school donations be shared with the poorest campuses in Santa Monica and Malibu apparently hasn’t hampered the community’s urge to give.
PTA groups in the Santa Monica-Malibu district plan to collectively spend nearly $200,000 more this school year than last year, district records show. That means parent contributions were assured to top $1,371,000 in 2004-2005.
Schools Superintendent John Deasy, who proposed the gift policy in 2003 as a way to help offset the wide discrepancy in fundraising at wealthy schools in Malibu and northern Santa Monica from those in poorer neighborhoods, said the results indicated that worries over the policy were misplaced.
“It’s pretty clear what’s happened,” Deasy said during a Friday interview. “It says that the fundraising through the PTA has been more generous and increased support for our schools... People have come to support this. People were really responsible around the policy and it’s really appreciated.”
Dozens of parents argued against the policy before its inception, saying it unfairly taxed the generosity of donors, and would lead to an overall decline in gifts. School board member Shane McLoud, one of two to vote against the policy, said Friday he was both surprised and pleased by the increase in donations.
“I’m ecstatic that PTA contributions are improved,” said McLoud, who teaches at a charter school in the Los Angeles Unified School District.
“That doesn’t change my position, I still feel, principally, it’s wrong to alter someone’s generosity,” he added. “But knowing the community as I do, I think this policy inspired a lot of parents to learn that a lot of students need extra resources and, in kind, they responded with increased contribution. So I’m pleased.”
PTA council president Maria Rodriguez, who works as a community liaison at John Adams Middle School, said the initial outrage over the proposal died as soon as the school board approved it. The PTA groups immediately began holding forums on the particulars of the policy, which doesn’t affect gifts for scholarships and PTA operating expenses, or gifts that benefit all district schools.
“Overall, it has been pretty positive,” Rodriguez said. “I was actually pleasantly surprised because we went through a pretty extensive information, question and input period from the different (PTA) units... Once the decision was made, then we tried to look at ways to try and make it work — it is what it is.”
Even wealthy schools, where the most vociferous opposition to the gift policy was heard, have experienced an increase in donations. According to district records, donations to the PTA at Pt. Dume Elementary rose from $219,002 before the gift policy to a minimum of $225, 950 this year, while at Webster Elementary donations rose from $259,885 to a base of $290,800. At Franklin Elementary in Santa Monica, the donations rose from $196,459 to $206,100.
The policy calls for 15 percent of school donations to go into a central fund, to be distributed to schools in the district at the end of the school year, based on need. It’s unclear how much money that fund will net this year, though Deasy said he expects the fund will receive at least $130,000, and probably more.
“At the end of the year, we’ll know the total amount that actually got contributed into that fund through all of the gift giving,” he said.
Added McLoud: “One thing this whole controversial policy has created is an awareness that there are students that need extra — there’s an inequity with some students and some schools, and they benefit from increased contributions.”
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on February 5, 2005. Read the original PDF.