According to the U.S. News and World Report, New Mexico currently ranks last in the country when it comes to education. Results released last year from spring standardized testing showed that 38% of tested students were proficient in reading, with statewide math proficiency standing stagnant at 24%.
To address the education issue, Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham signed into law House Bill 130 in March of 2023. The bill was intended to improve academic outcomes for New Mexico students through increased classroom time, requiring all students to receive at least 1,140 instructional hours per year—an increase from previous requirements of at least 990 hours for elementary school students and 1,040 hours for secondary school students. Earlier this year, the Public Education Department moved forward with a mandatory 180 school day calendar, despite the state law that is House Bill 130 which said that school calendars should be based on the total number of instructional hours and not necessarily days.
Currently, 53 New Mexico school districts are challenging the 180-day rule that would require a five-day school week instead of four that many school districts utilize, especially rural districts. Stan Rounds is the executive director for the New Mexico School Superintendents Association and the New Mexico Coalition of Educational Leaders. He explains the ramifications of smaller school districts going from a four-day school week to a five-day week.
“So if you run buses an additional day...now help me do the math here. If you do four days a week and go to five days a week, I think that's a 20% increase in cost, because you're still running the same miles having to hire somebody for all of that, right? Burning the same diesel or gas or electricity nowadays. You also have to have the requirement under New Mexico law to provide school food services, both breakfast and lunch free to students. And under that, you'd have to have another day of those services and costs of those foods. And that cost actually escalates to about 22% statewide.”
Mary Parr-Sanchez, president of NEA-New Mexico, is concerned that returning to a five-day school week from a four-day week would also affect teacher retention.
“It's going to affect the district's ability to recruit and to retain those educators in those rural districts where they don't have enough teachers being produced by those small rural places, where they are driving in from someplace else. The appeal is that they can travel four days out of the seven. And that may be from 45 minutes to an hour they would travel to get to... I know there were educators that were traveling from Los Lunas to Socorro. Socorro Independent School District had a four-day school week, and the way they were able to recruit from their places is they offered that four-day week for both students and educators.”
KRWG Public Media reached out to the New Mexico Public Education Department for an interview about this issue. A statement was issued instead, which read:
“We believe the Public Education Department has the rule making authority to set guidelines for school calendars in the best interests of students. Evidence shows more days in the classroom, not just more hours, improves student performance and ensures that New Mexico children receive the classroom time they need to succeed. We are exploring our legal options as we continue to fight this lawsuit and do everything we can to improve the public education system in New Mexico”.
Stan Rounds responded to the statement.
“Well, I believe that well defines the position of the Public Education Department, and that's where we're at loggerheads on this. I assure you, as I've traveled around to every district in this state, I have been in almost every building in the state of New Mexico during my time in this job. And what I'll tell you is, communities are different. The ability to invest time in students looks different in different places. That is what we are in court about.”
Rounds said that the 180-day rule still doesn’t address a larger education issue: student lack of attendance.
“You know, our greatest problem is that they're not coming to school still. We have a chronic absentee rate in the state of New Mexico that's well over 35% at the end of this year. We need to solve that. And I'm convinced just adding days to be there is unlikely to take those students who are not attending school and causing them to want to attend. It's more likely that it's what we do when we have them: how we engage with them and their families, so that we can construct a system that is remarkable for them and meets the needs of students have.”
Last month, the Ninth Judicial District court issued a preliminary injunction against the New Mexico Public Education Department’s proposed 180-day instructional year for public schools across the state, which is still scheduled to take affect on July 1st. For KRWG Public Media, I’m Scott Brocato.
