Lawsuit Schmawsuit: School Districts Spending Like Drunken Sailors with California’s $3 Billion ‘Play Budget’

The headline does not imply anything against drunken sailors. I once drank with US sailors at a bar called Scotties in Hong Kong, thanking them for their service in Desert Storm. From what I can remember, money was spent irresponsibly. Beer does that. 

But so does having over $3 Billion to spend on after school programs that can NOT be “an extension of the instructional day.” You read that right, the California Legislature distributed over $3 Billion for programs that are not necessarily academic in nature in 2024-25 alone.

Extended Learning Opportunities Program

In fact, school districts around California are receiving millions of dollars to, according to California Education Code 46120,  “…engage students in enrichment, play, nutrition, and other developmentally appropriate activities” in before and after school programs.

California Education Code 46120, which established the Extended Learning Opportunities Program, or ELOP, for California schools in 2022, has been amended through four bills since its inception. The most current version was last amended by AB 176 in 2024. 

California budgeted $3,995,000,000 to hand out to Local Educational Agencies (LEAs), which includes school districts, in 2024-25. The money does not come to the district without strings, however. For instance, districts must “…prioritize…schoolsites in the lowest income communities, as determined by prior year percentages of pupils eligible for free and reduced-price meals, while maximizing the number of schools and neighborhoods with expanded learning opportunity programs across their attendance area.” 

Districts are also “…encouraged to collaborate with community-based organizations and childcare providers, especially those participating in state or federally subsidized childcare programs.”

In short, Extended Learning Opportunity Programs are daycares. Districts must offer those programs to all students, but in the poor neighborhoods first. The amount of money a school district receives depends on the number of free lunches it has, and other equity factors. In fact, the formula to determine allocation of the $3 billion pool of taxpayer money is called the “Equity Multiplier.” ELOPs are optional for students, but any parent can demand placement in any program.

A closer look at how districts use the money reveals the familiar pattern of the “whole child” /community school approach, which seeks to supplant State indoctrination over parents’ influence. While the concept of school site before/after care is not new, the idea that daycares must provide entertainment that is more suitable for families to engage outside of the school’s purview, is new. 

In addition, the number of adults that are not district employees that come into contact with children through the ELOP program should be concerning for any parent. 

If California has billions of dollars to waste on play programs, while their student’s scores in English and Math remain at the lower dregs of proficiency, why would they care about U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon’s lawsuit over democrats obsession with boys pretending to be girls? Perhaps Governor Gav and his band of miscreant Lil’ Rascals, who consistently refer to California as a “donor State,” should just cede the lawsuit and redirect all that play money? 

Perhaps because the lawsuit clearly says that California’s “current allocation of funds to CDE for fiscal year 2025 totals approximately $44.3 billion…”  and still has $3.8 billion that “remains for drawdown….”  

No, Gavin and California will fight that lawsuit to the bitter end, and will continue to dole out tens of millions of dollars to school districts that will scramble to prop up local business’s side hustle of portable “engaging” day care, which appear to be a pretty lucrative cottage industry. 

Case Study

Such is the case for one California school district, Desert Sands Unified (DSUSD) in La Quinta, California, which does indeed receive $23 million from the State of California to spend on before or after school programs 

As it so happens, the DSUSD is set to approve 33 ELOP Independent Contractor Agreements for the 2025-26 school year, worth over $10 million, at their general meeting on July 15. Which seems like a lot of money for organized playdates and indoctrination opportunities but is not even half of the $23 million allocated to it by the State. 

The contractors that the DSUSD is set to hire offer activities ranging from ji jitsu to “street art” to ukelele lessons, but most have two things in common: They are activities that parents should be responsible for; and they do not improve academic skills. 

The latter should be of the utmost importance to the DSUSD, which only has three schools with Math/English proficiency scores over 50%. Many programs are focused on Equity or Social Emotional Learning (SEL) and a few, well, just make you wonder.

Remember, according to Education Code 46120, these programs are optional but available to all that request placement in any program offered by the district. Many of these programs have a limit to how many students they accept, usually 20 but as low as 15 and as high as 30.

There simply wasn’t time, between the release of the DSUSD Agenda Friday and the meeting on Tuesday, to vet every one of those 33 contractors. In fact, there was only time to research one contractor beyond the information given in DSUSD’s agenda rationale and the contracts themselves. That digging revealed the owner of the nonprofit, hired by the district to provide daycare, was a proud protestor at the well-funded, and in places violent, Marxist NO KINGS demonstration. 

Which par for the course with DSUSD, which has a rich history of hiring Marxist DEI activists. Since these contracts do not start, for the most part, until the Fall, there is still time to more thoroughly vet. For now, here a few of the more interesting daycare contracts set to be approved. Note that some are continuing contracts.

ELOP Finalists:

About Families

First up is an Independent Contractor Agreement (ICA) with a local nonprofit About Families (EIN: 27-5411622) worth $218,070 to serve one TK-5 elementary school with a daily after school program. The contract includes a separate summer program, and both are capped at 30 kids. 

According to the contract, ten adults will come into contact with district students, but background check responsibility is placed on About Families, they just have to swear they did them and everyone passed. 

The contract also describes the program as a daycare known as the Mariposa Parent-Child Workshop, focused on Social Emotion Wellness with activities including music lessons, animal care, cooking, and yoga.

About Families, according to IRS records, is a 501(c)3 nonprofit that was first founded by Joanna Boles Whitlow and Matthew Gonda in 2011. According to the About Families website, Gonda is a CPA from Nashville, Tennessee, and Whitlow is a Doula and lactation educator. 

For those that may wonder what a Doula is, we ran into one at a previous board meeting that was a self-described planned parenthood activist and a Doula—which is kind of like a midwife but for your emotions. As far as what a lactation educator does, your guess is as good, and probably better, than mine.

In a past interview, Whitlow proclaimed that “We believe that it takes a village and we want to be the hub of the village,” which echoes Hillary Clinton. Scary, but does dovetail with her activism. More on that another time.

It is important to note that nearly all of the 33 ICA contracts show that multiple people from the entity will have unsupervised contact with children and in most cases simply swear on the form that background checks have been completed.

 

 

Art Flying Aerial LLC

There are six ELOP contracts for what could be classified as athletics. Two contracts are for dance studios ($139,000 and $111,700). One contract each for colorguard ($204,000) and for jiu-jitsu ($119,000). There are three programs centered on Yoga worth about $100,000 taken together.

Art Flying Aerial’s ICA, worth $37,700, is to provide “…an aerial arts program” to three TK-5 elementary schools. Like most other ELOP contracts, the program is once a week for one hour and is capped at 20 students.

As with many other independent contractors providing ELOPs to the district, Art Flying Aerial has a physical place of business but bring the equipment to the schools. The following images should explain what the flying arts are better than my words, but it’s like yoga on a rope and apparently amazing enough for bachelorette parties.

 

Theater

There are two ELOPs with theater companies (worth just over $100,000 together) and both are centered on Social Emotional Learning. Which is somewhat ironic considering so many California democrats seem to be grown-up theater kids themselves. Looking at you Alex “Jose” Padilla.

A $94,588 ICA with Green Room Theater for instance, will focus instruction on Ballet Folklorico but with an emphasis on Social Emotional Learning…and covid precautions.

 

Another ICA with Desert Theatre Works ($15,500) provides, according to the DSUSD rationale, “a safe and nurturing environment where children can experience the performing arts in a fun and engaging way.” 

How will they do that you ask? 

Why by “using the art of reader theater [to] develop skills that support emotional well-being….” In other words, the program “blends SEL principles with foundational tools in theater, helping students grow both personally and artistically.”

Art

There are seven Art programs, including one program, Art Major Studio ($175,000), which services three TK-5 elementary schools, that combines cooking with art.

Another program, Flat Black Art Supply, Inc.($50,000), provides an “after-school street art program” for two middle schools. According to the district rationale, students will “…explore the history of street art and its influence on contemporary culture. The program will also feature workshops led by local artists, introducing students to techniques such as water-based painting, lettering, character design, color mixing, and more.”

Another ICA with Skye High Designs, which does business as Pinot’s Palette, is actually two contracts. The first contract ($238,750) provides art lessons from an “entertainer”  to 13 elementary and middle schools. The second contract ($752,400) services 22 elementary and middle schools.

STEM

Three ICA contracts are for programs described as Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math, commonly known as STEM, although some programs throw Art into the mix, which brews up STEAM programs.

An ICA with the Windtree Foundation ($547,200-16 schools and $83,500-5 schools) is one example. According to the program description in the contract, it provides a variety of science and robotics programs but also uses costumes and puppets.

Another STEAM program is Drone Soccer Play ($56.675-two schools), using a simulator on a laptop. Yet another STEAM program, Distance 2B Traveled, which owned and operated by, according to the district rationale, a “hiking consultant and desert educator with over 33 years of experience in local history, geology, and environmental exploration.” The program consists of presentations and videos about hiking and one actual “hike,” which is probably a walk around the site campus.

Sober up California

These are just a few examples of daycare programs that are being slapped together by school districts to gain access to that sweet California taxpayer money. If you are a local business, AND you can convincingly speak DEI and SEL, setting up a portable daycare for schools can be lucrative.

If you are any type of conservative business, voted for Trump, or did not wear a mask or take a vaccine during covid, you will probably not be approved by your local school district. Thus, no taxpayer money for you. If daycare can be drone soccer with drones or balls, why not a gun safety and marksmanship without guns, or a Daisy Red Ryder?

Yet, should it really be the role of school districts, through the State of California, to contract with outside providers for “engaging” daycare? Sure, a YMCA type before/after school that parents pay to use can be helpful, but daycare starts getting “reimagined” it starts getting costly (for the taxpayer). 

Gen X had the bus stop.