San Mateo-Foster City district says four of five pilot schools were recommended for state community-schools grants; district outlines implementation and budget

San Mateo-Foster City School District officials told the board at a May 9 study session that the district's community-schools implementation application was recommended by the California Department of Education (CDE) for four of the five pilot elementary sites and that the district is moving into the five-year implementation phase.

Dr. Cristiano, who introduced himself in the presentation as the district's director of school leadership and community-schools lead, said the district completed two planning years and submitted the implementation application early. "If you total this with the planning grant to date, it's, like, over $5,000,000 that we have received and will receive," he said, describing the aggregate funding for the cohort as an approximate figure the district used in its materials.

The presentation named the five participating elementary schools as Fiesta Gardens International School, Laurel Elementary School, Lee Elementary, Summerdale Park Elementary School and Sunnybrook Elementary School. Dr. Cristiano summarized the CDE rubric and said one scoring path awarded 50% of an applicant's points to schools with an unduplicated pupil percentage (UPC) of about 70% or higher (UPC includes English learners, students eligible for free or reduced-price meals and foster youth). He read per-site UPC figures from the district's implementation packet using 2022
3 data that the CDE used in scoring.

Janette Ramirez, described in the presentation as a principal on special assignment who joined the initiative from Fiesta Gardens, told the board that parents took leading roles in steering-committee sessions and that the planning process emphasized family empowerment. Magna Zellian Gutierrez, a community-service specialist at the district office, said the outreach team focused on relationship building and connecting families to services such as dental and vision care, clothing and food pantries and expanded after-school opportunities.

In question-and-answer, board members and members of the public pressed staff for clarifications about staffing and sustainability. One public commenter, Gabe, asked whether a job description exists for the site-based community-schools coordinator and urged more staff meetings; the district said steering committees would partner on site decisions and that steering committees would help determine the coordinator role at each school.

The superintendent (who spoke in the Q&A and identified the role, but not a personal name in the transcript) told the board the district would likely assign district-level grant-compliance duties to an existing administrator rather than create a new district-office position. He also estimated the approximate implementation budget per site at about $250,000 per year for initial planning and programming.

Fiesta Gardens: not recommended this cohort; district plan to support in interim
The presentation and subsequent discussion addressed Fiesta Gardens specifically. Staff told the board that Fiesta Gardens was not recommended for the current cohort largely because the CDE used older UPC data in its scoring; the district said its current UPC figure is higher (the presentation reported the school's current UPC at about 67.5%) and that the district expects to reapply for a future cohort. The superintendent said the district had set aside local funds to support Fiesta Gardens if a state award did not arrive immediately.

Additional funding pursuits and sustainability
Board and staff members said the district will pursue additional funding streams to support long-term sustainability, including competitive local grants through the district education foundation (Measure K-related funding) and a planned federal mental-health grant application that staff described as capable of bringing approximately $3 million for mental-health services at priority schools. Officials emphasized that the five-year CDE implementation award is one element of a broader, multi-source funding strategy.

Next steps and implementation timeline
Staff said the district will move from planning into an implementation phase beginning with the 2024
2025 school year, maintain district- and site-level steering committees and train site-based coordinators and community-school staff. The presentation noted a May 22 celebratory event tied to the planning cycle and said award letters from the state are still pending formal issuance; the district emphasized ongoing monitoring of UPC data and iterative updates to site plans.

Meeting business
Earlier in the meeting the board approved the agenda by roll call vote and later adjourned the study session at about 6:58 p.m. The community-schools presentation was informational; no board action to accept or obligate grant funds was recorded in the transcript.