Once imperiled K-3 summer program to expand
Budget uptick allows state to commit $25 million to school initiative that will serve 22,121 mostly poor students
In a turnabout after a protracted budget slump, New Mexico will expand a summer school program that provides 25 extra days of instruction to some of the state’s neediest students.
The K-3 Plus program will cost $28 million and be available to all 50 school districts and charter schools that applied for funding, the Public Education Department announced Monday. That is an increase in funding of $4 million over last year.
State leaders had previously said that, because of declining budgets, the program would be cut by 15 percent annually for at least three years.
That news left dozens of districts, including Santa Fe, scrambling for other ways to fund the decade-old program. In many cases, districts had to cancel the program.
But with state revenues now on the upswing largely because of increased oil drilling, a record 22,121 students will participate in this summer’s sessions, Gov. Susana Martinez said in a statement. That is up from about 14,000 in 2017.
Martinez’s statement said she advocated for the extra money. This drew immediate criticism from state Sen. Mimi Stewart, D-Albuquerque.
“For her to take credit is so hypocritical,” Stewart said of the Republican governor. “Especially after last year when they cut thousands of students from the program … She has never suggested increases in any of her budgets.”
Sen. Bill Soules, D-Las Cruces, the Senate Education Committee chairman, was less critical of the governor. He said it was legislators who allocated the extra funding, but the governor agreed to it by signing that section of the budget. Rep. Jimmie Hall, R-Albuquerque, said he was happy because the program is effective.
“This gives us more money to give more children a better education,” he said.
Santa Fe Public Schools received $1.386 million for the program, which is what it requested. Albuquerque Public Schools, a much larger district, will get about $6.8 million.
Santa Fe Superintendent Veronica García said the district this summer is getting a 43 percent increase in funding for the program, which serves children from 13 elementary schools at nine different sites.
And in a new initiative, the state will expand the summer program to fourthand fifth-graders in 24 districts and in charter schools that applied for funding. Albuquerque and Santa Fe did not pursue those grants, but other districts did. Española and Deming are two that will be part of the pilot program.
This initiative had long been touted by Martinez and former Education Secretary Hanna Skandera as a way to narrow the achievement gap between lowincome children and other students.
New Mexico’s K-3 Plus Program targets schools with high populations of
impoverished students or schools that have received a D or F grade from the Public Education Department.
Advocates say the extra five weeks of instruction in summer helps students improve in reading, writing and math.
“When implemented well with a keen eye towards outstanding instruction for all, this initiative can be a game-changer,” said Public Education Secretary-designate Christopher Ruszkowski.
But a five-year legislative study of the K-3 Plus program in New Mexico released in December 2015 reported mixed results. While students made significant short-term gains, those improvements tended to flatten out over time, that report said.
One problem, that report said, is that students who take part in the K-3 Plus summer program don’t necessarily continue to work with the same teacher they had during summer.
Española Public Schools’ Superintendent Bobbie Gutierrez said she believes the K-3 Plus courses help students. “Slowly but surely we have seen some increases in our overall student achievement scores at the elementary school level because of K-3 Plus,” Gutierrez said.
The new grant money will help her district enroll 380 children in the K-3 Plus program and another 84 in the fourth- and fifth-grade component, she said.