Welcome to Pennekamp Elementary School!

Pennekamp Elementary School is devoted to maximizing your student's learning and providing a physically and emotionally safe environment. Our mission statement describes Pennekamp as a place “Where Every Dragon Learns and R.O.A.R.S.!”  Our staff is committed to working as a professional learning community to target instruction and assessment and to ensure every child learns at high levels.  To support a positive learning environment, students are taught how to exemplify and uphold our PBIS school values (acronym R.O.A.R.S.): respectful, on-task, accountable, responsible, and safe.

Maximizing academic success for all students at Pennekamp is done using standards-based instruction within a personalized learning framework.  Working in collaborative grade-level teams, teachers identify and support students at, above, and below grade level by collecting and analyzing a variety of data points.  Using universal accommodations, differentiated instruction, and a multi-tiered system of support (MTSS), all students are able to be successful. 

Pennekamp places great emphasis on developing a climate of care, equity, diversity, and inclusion.  Students take pride in their ability to exemplify the PBIS values, but also the ways in which they celebrate the ideas and actions that make humans similar, but also different.  Our school takes pride in being designated as a No Place for Hate® campus by the Anti-Defamation League Los Angeles. Students engage in activities throughout the program that are designed to address school-based issues and create long-term solutions to help build a more inclusive and positive school culture.

Our strengths are best reflected in the attitude and performance of students, staff, and parents.  Finding dozens of volunteers on campus is not uncommon on any given day. Each year, our volunteers log in excess of 30,000 hours of service to the school. The school community values education and sets high expectations for students and staff. Through the generous grants provided by our Manhattan Beach Education Foundation (MBEF), students are able to experience, and parents may choose to volunteer for Makerspace, Science Lab, library, and P.E. 

Pennekamp also has weekly all-school morning assemblies, 5th grade ambassadors, a recess “mind lounge,” and a school garden. Pennekamp students are given well-rounded opportunities to extend and enhance the typical curriculum. Go Dragons!

Sincerely,

Sharon Witzansky
Principal