Latest news with #StateEqualizationGuarantee
Yahoo
13-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Micro school districts ask for more state funding, local control
Micro school districts ask New Mexico lawmakers for more state funding and local control. (Photo courtesy Santa Fe Public Schools) Leaders from New Mexico's 'micro school districts' emphasized to lawmakers on Tuesday the need for local control, more state funding and opportunities for students and teachers in rural areas. According to an LFC brief, micro school districts are ones with 200 or fewer students; New Mexico has 20 such districts spread throughout rural areas of the state serving a total of 2,360 students. Mosquero Municipal Schools, one of the state's micro school districts, hosted members of the Legislative Finance Committee Tuesday for the first LFC meeting of the interim this year. Mosquero is located in northeast New Mexico in Harding and San Miguel counties. Mosquero Municipal Schools Governing Board President Victor Vigil told lawmakers local control is key to districts' success and a one-size-fits-all approach does not make sense when comparing districts that serve only a couple hundred students and more urban districts serving thousands. He emphasized that schools in rural areas serve not only as places of learning, but also as community gathering places and sources of information because libraries, museums, businesses and other facilities are not readily accessible. 'The school is the heartbeat of the town. It's the heartbeat of a community, especially in a rural area,' Vigil said during the meeting. Mosquero Superintendent Johnna Bruhn highlighted the need for additional state funds for micro districts. According to the LFC hearing brief, micro districts received $26,100 per student from the State Equalization Guarantee distribution this year, compared to the statewide average of $13,900. However, funding does not stretch as far in rural areas as in urban areas, she said. 'One of the things that would help is if micro districts were funded like we had 100 kids, even if we don't,' Bruhn said. 'That would allow us to make the…adjustments that we need to deliver all the educational requirements that this state has for our kids, to our kids. With less than that, we can't do it.' The LFC brief noted that micro districts rely chronically on emergency supplemental funds from the Public Education Department. Bruhn also pointed out that if the PED's rule requiring 180 instructional days in a school year were implemented in her district, it would require changing the calendar to a five-day school week with a later start time to allow students and staff to travel to school. She said that would increase travel time to about 15 hours per week rather than the current 12 hours. 'Instructional time would actually decrease to 27.5 hours per week. The four-day week is essential here,' she said. Bruhn added that more incentives to entice highly qualified teachers to work in micro districts are needed, including housing because many staff members, including herself, live in surrounding towns. Rep. Derrick Lente (D-Sandia Pueblo), a member of the LFC, said many of the concerns Bruhn presented are similar to those of Native communities in New Mexico. Local control of how and what students are taught is influenced by culture and tradition — lawmakers noted during the discussion that Mosquero and the surrounding area is largely influenced by agricultural work. 'If what is important to this community is farming and ranching, the same thing is being said by those pueblos, tribes and nations when we talk about making sure that what we're teaching our children in terms of a culture, in terms of a practice are rooted in a native language,' Lente said. 'I think that we need to share these with the PED because these shouldn't be a liability, but these should be an eye opener in terms of how we need to look at things differently for rural education.' SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX
Yahoo
18-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Albuquerque Public Schools discusses nearly $2 billion budget for upcoming year
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (KRQE) – Facing higher costs, fewer students, and a shake-up in federal funding from Washington D.C., Albuquerque Public Schools is figuring out how it's going to budget more than $2 billion in expenses over the next year. Story continues below Podcast: What Will Voters Do With $1.5 Million? Entertainment: These movies were filmed in Las Cruces. Have you seen them? Crime: ABQ man charged federally for arson attacks at Tesla, Republican Party headquarters Weird: Peacocks spotted in Albuquerque neighborhoods. Where did they come from? 'We have come a long way in a year but we have come a long way but this is just the beginning,' said Gabriella Blakey, APS superintendent. That's how Albuquerque Public School leaders are describing their next budget, as APS continues to face a wide range of challenges from costs to how many students are part of their schools. 'We still face challenges like our declining enrollment, a trend that we are seeing across the country,' said Gabriella Blakey, APS superintendent. APS is projecting an enrollment of about 65,000 students for 2026. With state funding determined by the number of students, an enrollment drop means less money. District officials expect this year's budget to be similar to the last, roughly 2.1 billion. APS is also projecting an increase in the State Equalization Guarantee, which will help fund a four-percent pay hike for all employees. Ahead of a final vote on the budget, some board members are worried about potential federal funding impacts under the trump administration. 'There's so much influx right now, it's hard to, there's so many buckets,' said Josefina E. Domínguez, APS Board of Education member. However, APS administrators say so far, they're not worried about any losses to federal dollars. Other key issues, including putting more focus on program evaluations this upcoming fiscal year, and if a program isn't working, top administrators said that's where the district should consider faster changes. 'We need to be bold and we need to be able to say that we are going to strategically abandon some of those initiatives,' said Dr. Antonio Gonzales, Deputy Superintendent for Leadership & Learning, APS. The Board of Education is scheduled to vote on the final budget early next month. Right now, they're on track to use nearly $5 million in reserves to cover some of their costs. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
10-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Ed funding overhaul nears final steps despite concerns about secondary school boost
Key provisions of a plan to overhaul New Mexico's per-student formula for financing public K-12 education are raising concerns even as the proposal nears the finish line. State lawmakers already have allocated $4.4 billion for education spending — the single biggest piece of New Mexico's proposed budget for fiscal year 2026. House Bill 63, the result of two years of inquiry by the Legislative Education Study Committee, would make some changes to how the state divvies that money by student, offering up targeted funds for English learners and altering the state's method for identifying students in poverty. It also lays out extra funding for most middle and high school students; while, the proposal sailed through the Senate Education Committee with unanimous support Monday, whether it will secure the additional money for secondary students remains uncertain. 'In House Appropriations and Finance, in the budget-making process, the increase to the secondary factor — the large increase that we had — didn't make it into the budget,' the bill's sponsor, Rep. Andrés Romero, D-Albuquerque, told the committee. Charter schools also voiced concerns about a potential loss of funds because of the bill's changes. New Mexico's education funding formula, known as the State Equalization Guarantee, provides money to schools based on the number of students they serve, with each student currently worth about $6,000 per year. But the formula also factors in certain student attributes — such as grade level, special education services, family income level and participation in fine arts or other specialty programs — in calculating the total dollar amount a student will bring to their school as a way to account for additional and sometimes more expensive needs. House Bill 63 proposes a few big changes to the State Equalization Guarantee. First, it would calculate schools' "at-risk" funding — a special pot of money intended to address the needs of students in groups considered at risk of failing — based on the Family Income Index, a measure established by the Legislature in 2021 to better estimate the number of students living in poverty at each public school. That change, Romero said, would provide a 'better way to really pinpoint' which schools generated those funds and how they're using them to better support students. Second, HB 63 would create a new financial factor in the funding formula, creating a stand-alone credit to support 'identified services to assist English learners to attain English language proficiency.' English learners were previously included as one of several factors in the 'at-risk' category. The original version of the bill proposed a third major change: An increase in state spending for middle and high schools, intended to target the downturn in proficiency and attendance that typically comes during those years. Changes in the House Appropriations and Finance Committee, however, struck those increases for all but sixth grade. Additional dollars for seventh through 12th graders did not make it into the committee's budget proposal. Lawmakers haven't given up on extra funding for secondary students, though. "We're working with the [Senate] Finance Committee about putting that funding back into the budget over on this side," said Sen. Bill Soules, D-Las Cruces. Another sticking point for the bill: Charter schools worry about proposed technical changes that would allow them to generate their own at-risk index based on their number of students in poverty, rather than using figures from their home school district. On the whole, that's not a bad thing, said Matt Pahl, executive director of Public Charter Schools of New Mexico. "This has been something charter schools have been wanting for a number of years — the ability to generate our own at-risk index," Pahl told the committee. However, the change could provide a charter school with more or less at-risk funding — depending on how different it is from its home district. The bill currently includes an extra $5 million cushion, intended to keep state education funds for charter schools steady for one year, even if the updated funding formula would call for decreases. Romero, who represents much of Albuquerque's South Valley, noted some charter schools in his area could benefit from the change because they serve a higher population of at-risk students than Albuquerque Public Schools overall. Jason Morgan, principal of the Academy for Technology and the Classics in Santa Fe, said the district-chartered school would see a drop of about $200,000. Morgan asked lawmakers to consider extending what's known as the "hold harmless" period — when current funding levels would be maintained — to three years. "A one-year hold harmless means we're going to be preparing for that now. A three-year hold harmless gives us a minute to breathe," Morgan said. Romero said he's open to making that change and plans to prioritize it throughout the interim period between legislative sessions, though it ultimately will depend on the will of the state's financial committees.
