MBUSD Reports Small Enrollment Increase; Departing Families Show Satisfaction
Oct 14, 2022 09:58AM ● By Jeanne Fratello
Are the Manhattan Beach schools losing or gaining students, and for those who leave, why are they leaving?
According to preliminary numbers released at the Manhattan Beach Unified School District's board meeting on Wednesday night, there has been a tiny increase in enrollment this year for the Manhattan Beach schools.
Furthermore, the exit data from those who did leave showed overall satisfaction with the district.
Preliminary Numbers Show Enrollment Increases
This year's preliminary fall 2022 enrollment numbers show an increase of 1%, from 5,852 students last year to 5.897 this year.
Specifically, the numbers show a 2% increase in elementary school enrollment, a
4% decrease in middle school enrollment, and a 2% increase in high
school enrollment.
"The headline is that we met our target, which is good news," said MBUSD Deputy Superintendent Dawnalyn Murakawa-Leopard.
Following pandemic decreases that were seen across the board, "We’re turning the corner and starting to climb back up," she said.
Murakawa-Leopard added that anecdotally, from talking to counterparts at other school districts, Manhattan Beach is one of the few districts that is going to show an increase in enrollment for this year.
One interesting piece is that when looking consistently across cohorts (i.e. last year's 1st grade class moving up to become this year's 2nd grade class), all but one of the cohort groups increased. (The cohort that moved from 6th grade to 7th grade decreased by 5 students.)
A look at secondary cohorts as they move from year to year shows an increase in all cohorts except the group that moved from 6th grade to 7th grade. Source: MBUSDMeanwhile, the 12th grade class that graduated in 2022 was a large one, with 620 students; compared to this year's 12th grade class that only has 591 students. However, this year's 12th grade class has grown; they had only 577 students last year when they were in 11th grade.
Exit Surveys Indicate Satisfaction with Schools
The district also released information from exit surveys conducted among families who left MBUSD in the 2021/22 school year.
Of the 259 withdrawals, the districts received 194 responses, or a 75 percent response rate.
Out of 194 students, 115 students or 59% were either moving out of MBUSD boundaries or returning to their public school district of residence (i.e. permit students, or students of employees).
More specifically, the surveys showed that:
- In Pre-K to 2, 74% were either moving out of MBUSD boundaries or returning to their public school district of residence (51 students); and 26% were enrolling in private or parochial schools (18 students).
- In Grades 3-5, 59% were either moving out of MBUSD boundaries or returning to their public school district of residence (13 students); 36% were enrolling in private or parochial schools (8 students), and 5% was unknown (1 student).
- In Grades 6-8, 37.5% were either moving out of MBUSD boundaries or returning to their public school district of residence (3 students); 37.5% were enrolling in private or parochial schools (3 students); and 25% were unknown or charter (2 students).
- In Grades 9-12, 51% were either moving out of MBUSD boundaries or returning to their public school district of residence (48 students); 43% were enrolling in private or parochial schools (41 students); and 6% were unknown or charter (6 students).
Moreover, the exit surveys found a reasonably high degree of satisfaction with the district from those who were leaving.
Source: MBUSD
Of those who responded, 94% said that they were either satisfied or neutral with MBUSD's efforts at maximizing student success; and 91% were either satisfied or neutral with MBUSD's efforts at providing a climate of care.
Assistant Superintendent Tom Stekol, who came to the district after the surveys were given, said that the surveys provided only rough data, and appeared not to have been given consistently across schools. He said that his team would be working to "fine tune" that data collection moving forward, but in the meantime there was still interesting information to pull from what had been collected.
"I believe there's a tendency for us to take a lot of this personally, and what we’re really looking for is, are those items that we can actually take personally?" said Stekol. "In order to do that we have to suss out all the things that really are just parts of life, when people have to move or go elsewhere for reasons that honestly have nothing to do with us or our performance."
Furthermore, Stekol added, "People leaving our schools are expressing high degrees of satisfaction. This tells me that life happens, and people are leaving not for reasons of dissatisfaction with our schools."
