SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) - An expert in professional development for teachers was named Thursday as New Mexico’s secretary of public education, as the state grapples with a court order to increase school resources for struggling children from minority and low-income families.
New Mexico State University dean and research director Karen Trujillo of Las Cruces was named to the Cabinet-level position as the new administration of Democratic Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham embarks on an overhaul of student testing and teacher evaluations.
As part of its push, the administration is pressuring lawmakers for a $500 million increase in annual spending on public schools.
The governor, who took office Jan. 1, introduced Trujillo alongside a newly appointed leadership team for the Department of Public Education that includes a specialist in Native American education.
“We are no longer in the time of punitive measures,” Trujillo said, emphasizing a break with the policies of recently departed two-term Republican Gov. Susana Martinez, who implemented A-F grades for school performance and incorporated student test results into teacher evaluations.
“We support teacher pay raises, we support more resources in the schools - for nurses, social workers,” Trujillo said.
Lujan Grisham has proposed increases in teacher salaries and minimum pay, provisions to lengthen the school year, expansion of curricula tailored to minority students and resources for at-risk students.
A district court judge last year found the state was failing to meet its constitutional requirements to provide an adequate education to all students and set an April deadline for the governor and lawmakers to come up with solutions.
Kara Bobroff, executive director of an Albuquerque-based support group for schools in Native American communities, will serve as one of three new deputy secretaries.
UCLA Professor Pedro Noguera, a sociologist whose research delves into the influence of social and economic conditions on schools - will serve as a special adviser to the secretary.
Other new deputy secretaries include Tim Hand, a veteran teacher and top staff member at the Legislature’s year-round education policy committee, and Katarina Sandoval, a director for academics with expertise in dual-language teaching at the Native American Community Academy in Albuquerque.
Gwen Perea Warniment, a program director at a nonprofit trust for research-based learning known as the Los Alamos National Laboratory Foundation, also was appointed as a deputy secretary.
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