This Thursday (1/21 AT 5pm) the School Board will hear a presentation from the Samohi Principal about proposed academies and an “update” from staff on Phase 3, which includes the demolition of the History Building and the spending of almost the entirety of what remains of $1.1 billion in bond funds. Neither item was scheduled as an action item, which demonstrates the school board and Superintendent plan to ignore growing public anger and opposition and simply “direct” staff to continue their work.

Please email the school board and Superintendent to tell them to press pause on the academies and demolition until they have studied adaptive reuse of the History Building.

SAMPLE EMAIL:

To: brd@smmusd.org, bdrati@smmusd.org, samohialumni@gmail.com, advocacy@smconservancy.org, fixsmmusd@gmail.com, council@smgov.net, senator.allen@senate.ca.gov

Re: January 21, 2021 School Board Meeting - Item E.1 (PBL High School and Academies); Item F.1 (Phase 3 Update)

Dear School Board and Superintendent Drati,

I am writing to ask that you slow down implementation of the academies and halt Phase 3 planning and construction until the District has studied adaptive reuse of the History Building.

CAREER ACADEMIES - They may end up being a good idea, but because there is so much that staff has not clarified. You cannot allow public funds to be spent implementing the program until all of the details have been presented to the public, including programming, operations, staff, and budgets.

Here is what we need to know before academies can be approved:

·       What is the goal and what will success look like? Is it more students going to college or more students graduating with certificates and going straight to work? These are different programs.

·       Have any employers in the city agreed to take on the program, provide internships, and hire students? If so, who are they?

·       What arrangements have been made with SMC to use their specialty facilities or faculty? Will the classes earn high school or college credit? Do all the classes qualify as (a)-(g) classes?

·       How many students are expected? 400 juniors and seniors is nearly a quarter of each class.

·       How will this impact the existing houses? Will the academies be in their own house? Who will administer the academies at Samohi?

·       What is the class size?

·       How many specialty teachers or SMC faculty will be needed and how many current Samohi teachers will be let go?

·       If 25% of juniors and seniors are moving to academies, which electives will be eliminated for the rest of the students?

·       How will the schedule work? What will the impact of the academy blocks be on existing programs like orchestra, band, choir, Spanish Immersion, and sports.

·       What are the operating costs? Staff previously stated the program would be cost-neutral, but we are now being asked to spend $70+ million on a new building and the model program has operating costs of $4.5 million per year. We are already deficit spending and need to cut costs, so what will be cut in order to fund academies?

Also, stop throwing good money after bad with the PBL High School. In 2 years it has fewer than 75 students and will not succeed. Use the time and money to train all teachers on project-based learning instead of continuing with a program that costs so much, impacts so few, and has no demonstrated success.

SAMOHI PHASE 3 AND HISTORY BUILDING - One thing we do know for certain, is that academies do not need new buildings.

First, at Samohi, all classrooms that were in the History Building have been replaced in the Discovery Building. This means that the non-lab classes (English and business) should be housed in the Discovery Building. Second, when the Innovation Building opened in 2015 the District claimed its many labs brought Samohi’s science program into the 21st Century. Several of these labs can be repurposed for the academies. Third, any art rooms can be placed in an adaptively reused History Building.

This leaves only the specialty spaces unaccounted for, and those spaces haven’t been defined. Given staff says the academies are joint projects with SMC, all specialty spaces at SMC should be used. For example, the Arts and Media campus on Stewart Street was recently completed using $61 million of our bond funds and there is no need to spend $70 million to replicate that on Samohi’s campus. Any need for a “pitch space” can be accommodated by library and/or student center space in an adaptively reused History Building.

Planning and construction of the Gold Gym may continue since its footprint is not impacted by keeping the History Building. But the community is demanding that you stop using our bond money to tear down cultural resources only to replace them with unnecessary vanity projects. These overpriced structures are also using up the remaining bond funds that were supposed to be used to remove portables and add/upgrade restrooms at other campuses.

You asked the public to trust you in the 2018 bond campaign and you are not keeping your promise. You cannot spend all of the bond money at Samohi and leave the other campuses in disrepair. The most recent bond proposals in California and Palos Verdes failed.

Taxpayers will not support another bond here in Santa Monica unless the School Board and Superintendent demonstrate they are responsive to the community’s request to save the History Building and spend what is left of the bonds on community priorities like open space and bathrooms.

Thank you,

[Your name]

[Santa Monica Resident and SMMUSD Parent]

Please include this in the public comments for the 1/21/2021 School Board meeting