Fundraising program for day schools meets goal
June 22nd, 2015
Five local day schools have collected more than 21 million ways to make Jewish education more affordable in Los Angeles.
A multiyear program to raise cash endowments and focus on tuition assistance called the Los Angeles High School Affordability Initiative finally met its goal last month. That’s when New Community Jewish High School, Milken Community Schools, Shalhevet High School, YULA Girls High School and YULA Boys High School announced they had collectively raised $17 million, a sum to which the Simha & Sara Lainer Day School Endowment Fund added $4.25 million.
The initiative was kick-started by the San Francisco-based Jim Joseph Foundation in 2008, with help from Builders of Jewish Education (BJE) and The Jewish Federation of Greater Los Angeles, to help connect more youths with local schools and — it is hoped — Jewish futures.
“Research tells us that day school education, successive summers of residential summer camping and immersive Israel experience lead to a commitment to Jewish life individually and communally,” explained Chip Edelsberg, Jim Joseph executive director. “It was a natural fit for us.”
Bruce Powell, head of school of New Community Jewish High School, said the $4 million his school raised for its endowment is going to be matched by Lainer with $1 million. With the 5 percent interest it expects to make on the fund, the school will be able to award $250,000 in tuition assistance to the middle-income families who need it.
Milken Community High School. Photo from Wikipedia
Shalhevet raised an equal amount, and received $1 million from the Lainer fund. Milken collected $5 million and got an additional $1.25 million from the Lainer fund, while each of the YULA schools raised $2 million, plus $500,000 from the Lainer fund.
To help middle-income families with this money, officials first had to define the group. Miriam Prum Hess, director of donor and community relations at BJE, said that she and her team found research from the California Budget & Policy Center indicating how much money it took to support two working parents and two children in Los Angeles (more than $70,000 at the time). Then they factored in the additional expenses of Jewish life.
These families were the ones who needed the most help in making the transition from Jewish middle schools to Jewish high schools, which can come with a 40 percent jump in cost. Higher-earning families could afford the tuition, and lower-earning families were already receiving assistance.
“The jump from middle to high school tuition was about 40 percent, and often families were not able to pay that extra amount,” Prum Hess said. “We wanted this to be a way to retain families that were in day school.”
Edelsberg said one of the reasons that the Jim Joseph Foundation supported the initiative was because “families in the middle get cut out. That’s what Los Angeles demonstrated to us. That’s not healthy, and it’s not the kind of student body you want.”
The initial program began in 2008, when Jim Joseph granted $12.7 million to BJE through Federation. That money was used mostly for tuition assistance for 600 families; the rest went toward funding the ability for schools to strengthen development staff, retrieve marketing materials, and train staff and school leaders about endowments and fundraising. BJE oversight was also factored into the grant.
Typically, Jewish day schools do not have significant endowments, according to Edelsberg. Through the Los Angeles High School Affordability Initiative, Jim Joseph hoped to modify that, as well as teach these schools about the importance of endowments and having funds for tuition assistance.
“For at least six years, those [$12.7 million in] funds can be used to continue to support the enrollment of high school-aged young men and women in middle-income families. All the schools are moving toward taking that term of six years and making it permanent.”
Now that the schools expect the funds to be there, Edelsberg said, they will continue to raise money on their own.
“The effort was one of changing the culture of the schools. We wanted to give them the support to secure endowment money within their own micro-communities at the schools.”
The official website for the initiative (lahighschoolaffordability.org) describes the whole process for the program, including how the funds from Jim Joseph were allocated, and how these five schools went from having zero dollars in endowment funds to millions. There are also links on how other communities can replicate the initiative and support Jewish schools.
“We appreciate opportunities where we can create a model and demonstrate that this kind of financial commitment would lead to a particular result,” Edelsberg said. “Now communities around the country have a tool to use.”
Prum Hess called the initiative a success, but it’s only the beginning.
“Six years ago there was no money in day school endowments, and now the schools are raising $17 million,” she said. “It’s not enough, but it’s a start.”
At least one educator, Powell, is committed to building his endowment fund as much as possible.
“We won’t stop here,” he said. “That’s the key to the whole thing. My goal is to get it at $30, $40 or $50 million, or as high as we can make it.”