Lawmakers Question State Authority Over Dulce Schools

This story was originally published in the Rio Grande SUN on July 19, 2018.

As the Dulce Independent School District continues to go through its Most Rigorous Intervention process, a group of legislators has questioned whether or not the state’s Public Education Department (PED) has the authority to intervene on failing schools.

According to the Legislative Education Study Committee, a bipartisan committee of 31 legislators that studies the laws and policies of New Mexico’s public education system, the Department is out of bounds in how it is implementing the intervention process.

This was first reported in a May 21 Albuquerque Journal article.

“It is unclear that PED has the explicit statutory authority to enforce plans for more rigorous interventions beyond providing the Title I funding,” a brief from the Committee states.

Committee Chair Sen. Mimi Stewart, D-Bernalillo County, said the four schools identified for the Most Rigorous Intervention process, which besides Dulce Elementary School includes three schools in the Albuquerque Public Schools district, do not appear as if they have violated any laws, regulations or Education Department standards.

All four schools have received a school grade of F for five or six years in a row. Dulce Elementary school has received an F grade since 2013. The Most Rigorous Intervention process allows these four schools to apply for Title I instruction money that can be used to improve the schools. At the beginning of the year, officials from the four schools had a choice of four different plans to turnaround their schools or give students and parents more schooling options.

Dulce’s Board of Education and district officials chose the Significant Restructure and Redesign plan.

Dulce Superintendent Pam Montoya did not return phone calls and emails, by presstime, requesting an interview about the District’s interaction with the Education Department during the Most Rigorous Intervention process.

Dulce District Attorney Barry Berenberg, of Albuquerque-based law firm Walsh Gallegos, said he could not speak or answer any questions on behalf of the District, but would pass them along.

The Committee brief explains that the state’s Every Student Succeeds Act plan, which was approved by the United States Department of Education in 2017, specified ways the Education Department is allowed to help underperforming schools.

According to the brief, gaps in state law leave it “unclear that PED has the authority to require, approve, conditionally approve, or disapprove school district plans for more rigorous interventions.”

The Committee cited three state laws to back their claim.

The first states that the Education Department can take over a school or district if they have failed to meet certain regulations, laws and standards. Standards are not defined within the law.

The second allows the Department to suspend a school board for financial mismanagement,

A final one allows the Department secretary to order compliance with provisions of the law.

“We really do not think they have the authority to close any school and even the New Mexico Every Student Succeeds Act plan says that you are in compliance support intervention for three years before you move into MRI,” Stewart said. “So we think PED has jumped the gun on these four schools.”

During a July 10 interview, Education Department Secretary Christopher Ruszkowski said the state’s Every Student Succeeds Act “gives authority to the states to set new sets of structures (and) frameworks and opportunities” to improve schools.

His Department has created a plan to help failing schools and serve students, and he said he has not seen the same thing come out of the Legislature or the Committee.

Although the Education Department is implementing the Most Rigorous Intervention process at the four schools, Stewart said Ruszkowski and other officials have refused to come in front of the Committee to answer any questions.

“We asked them to come (to a meeting) in Aztec,” Stewart said. “We asked them, to come in Las Cruces when we had our first meeting about (the Most Rigorous Intervention process) and they have declined. I think they reached out to us recently with a list of things they are willing to come and talk about, but I am not going to have them come talk to us if they don’t want to talk to us about what we want to talk about.”

According to the Committee’s brief, the Department officials have also failed to communicate with District officials.

Ruszkowski said the Education Department has been in constant communication with the District.