San Fernando High Granted Anti-Poverty Funding

For the first time, San Fernando High School is eligible for a special federal grant given schools with a large number of low-income students, despite its late application, Los Angeles Unified School District officials said Wednesday.

The amount is yet to be determined but is expected to be about $500,000, school officials said.

The issue now is how to divide the federal funding among the more than 400 eligible Los Angeles schools, said Terri Minami, who oversees allocation of the funds.

“The problem is most [eligible] schools already planned their budget,” but now “won’t get as much as they were anticipating” because of the addition of San Fernando High to the list, she said.

San Fernando High was in jeopardy of losing the grant because administrators there failed to turn in an application by the December deadline, although a change in qualification standards had increased the school’s chances.

The 3,200-student high school has never received grants from the anti-poverty program, known as Title I. The school qualified recently under new regulations that reduced the minimum number of impoverished students needed from 75% of the student body to 65%.

The delay in submitting its application excluded San Fernando when the district determined the list of 433 eligible schools in March.

State education officials have told the LAUSD that the $130.7 million it got in Title I funds last year would be reduced this year by 2% to 5%, which means the district will receive $124.3 million to $128.2 million, Minami said.

District officials reviewed the issue on a request by Supt. Sid Thompson. They did an initial audit of San Fernando students eligible for school lunches and will begin a second audit to check for duplicated names, said Margaret Jones, head of implementation of the Title I program. Jones said the double check is not likely to reduce the percentage of eligible students.

School board member David Tokofsky said San Fernando High should receive the Title I funds. “I don’t think it’s the kids’ fault that they have an administration who couldn’t input the information on time,” Tokofsky said.