Santa Monica School Board to Consider More Lax Permit Policy

February 8, 2012 -- Anticipating a slight drop in enrollment, the Santa Monica School Board is considering allowing more students who live outside the district to attend local schools.

The proposed policy would raise the limit on permit students who live outside Santa Monica and Malibu by 100, bringing the number of available permits to 300 for the 2012-2013 school year.

Other proposed changes include allowing students in grades seven through eleven and international students – on a case by case basis – to receive permits. The current policy prohibits students in those grades from entering the district.

Children of full-time employees of the School District, City and Santa Monica College; siblings of students currently on permits, children of district alumni and students in good standing who moved out of the district when the current permit policy took effect in 2011-2012.

A report delivered to the School Board at last Thursday's meeting in Malibu showed that in the next 10 years, there will likely be a slight decline in student enrollment in the district.

The report, prepared by DecisionInsite, projected high school enrollment to drop by almost 500 students between 2011 and 2021, in part because Santa Monica household should show little growth over the next decade.

As a result, district officials think there is room to allow more permit students into the school system.

Board member Jose Escarce was among the officials who advocated increasing available permits, saying that the district should aim to increase student enrollment from the current 11,249 to 11,500 students.

Part of the motivation is financial. The district receives $5,300 per student from the state, which Escarce said would more than pay for the new teachers required with the addition of new students.

One reason for considering changing the policy the policies, officials said, is because the circumstances have changed.

When the district originally prohibited students grade seven and higher from obtaining permits, district students accounted for 20 per cent of the student population. Today, approximately 13 per cent of students come from outside the SMMUSD boundaries, officials said.

According to a cluster map plotted by DecisionInsite, the bulk of students from outside the district come from West Los Angeles, Venice, Hawthorne and other nearby cities.

Some other revisions to the policy include doing away with the annual renewal process for permits and instead only requiring that students verify that they will enroll in the district.