ESPAÑOLA — Headlines of the last few years have made New Mexico out to be a difficult state to be a young person: high rates of school absences, low academic growth and a court ruling charging state leaders with fixing outcomes for students they have failed.
To get to the bottom of it, state lawmakers went to the students.
House Speaker Javier Martínez, D-Albuquerque, and Rep. Anita Gonzales, D-Las Vegas, met with students Wednesday as part of a youth panel hosted by education nonprofit Future Focused Education at Northern New Mexico College.
Dom Ruiz was happy to tell them what he thought.
The 16-year-old Alcalde resident recently served as a mock senator in the Lorenzo de Zavala Youth Legislative Simulation, a program run by the National Hispanic Institute where he introduced a bill to increase funding to college readiness programs. Ruiz credits the same programs with supporting his own educational journey when his parents, who did not graduate high school, could not.
“I think I have the mind and the capabilities to bring change,” said Ruiz, an Española Valley High School student who hopes to become a lawmaker someday himself.
“I look around at my community and a lot of [people] have the same problems,” he added. “I want to bring that power. Just like if I were in their position, I would want somebody to help me.”
In April, the Legislative Finance Committee reviewed a report showing more than 1 in 10 New Mexicans ages 18 to 24 were neither in school nor working, costing taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars annually.
“All of these precollege programs, there’s always a tie-in to that report,” Gonzales said. “How we are going to keep engaged young people in school, and how are we preparing them for jobs in the future … capturing those students in the gap between high school and life?”
She said that starts with lawmakers seeing individual departments’ efforts more collectively than they do currently.
“As we are looking to improve public education … you can’t do it without improving that pipeline,” she added.
Mia Romero, a first-generation college student and Española Valley graduate, said earning her associate degree and high school diploma in the same year convinced her that college support programs can be life-changing. She credited mentorship from Upward Bound, the federally funded college readiness program housed at Northern New Mexico College.
Though she admitted she almost didn’t join.
“When I first joined Upward Bound, I had only two reasons. One of my friends was going, and … I heard they feed us,” she said to laughs. “I feel like there’s not much emphasis on what these programs are or how they help their students.”
But the experience has been transformative.
“It made me really recognize how much work this is, not only for ourselves, but we’re honoring our families and our communities because we’re looking at a stigma, and we’re not following a stereotype of people from Northern New Mexico or Española,” she said to applause.
‘Cracked the code’
Most students on the panel came from the Española area and had worked as interns or participants with organizations partnered with Future Focused Education, including Upward Bound, Española Gloveworks and Santa Fe Improv.
Española native Ally Sandoval said the youth improv group convinced her theater could change her community.
“That’s kind of a crazy feeling because our work is getting out to people,” she said of a sold-out show. “They’re going out of their way to drive, to go walk, to pay money because they see potential in us.”
But, she added, none of it would have been possible without mentors.
“These are people who have been there for me since I met them,” Sandoval said. “They have absolutely never shown any judgment for me, and they’re always there to help me.”
Martínez called the students’ answers “very insightful.”
“There were a few things that you said that stuck with me that were probably my own blind spot,” he said, joking about pushing opportunities on his 19-year-old niece. “And I’m like, ‘Oh, maybe I shouldn’t do that,’ right?”
He shared his own story of mentorship, pointing to Northern New Mexico College President Hector Balderas as a mentor in his life and praised Future Focused Education for having “cracked the code.”
“For us as legislators, for us who appropriate dollars and whatnot, these are the ways, these are the investments that we should be making,” he said.
‘They know… the formula’
Future Focused Education, a nonprofit funded by state agencies, private philanthropy, tribal nations and industry partners, has held similar youth panels around the state.
In surveys of more than 2,500 students, the group found three recurring themes: Students want relevant coursework, schools that genuinely care about their well-being and trusted adults who can guide them.
The organization also brokers internships between employers and students, covering wages, insurance and mentorship costs. It worked with about 100 students in the Española area this year, up from only a handful last year.
The group had previously concentrated on Albuquerque and Santa Fe but shifted resources north after realizing rural communities with higher poverty rates often lacked the same work-based learning opportunities.
“We’re better positioned to help a market that needs it and doesn’t have those resources,” said Mike May, the nonprofit’s director of workforce learning.
The state launched a small pilot program this year to do something similar, he said, noting the nonprofit has submitted a response to the state Department of Workforce Solutions’ request for proposals.
While the value of bolstering mentorship and internship opportunities dominated the conversation, Juan Andres Maestas, an Española Valley graduate headed to New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology, brought it back to educational programs.
His internship with Española Gloveworks — a nonprofit that develops technology for people with Parkinson’s disease — showed him students can combine entrepreneurship with service, he said.
“It’s also helped students see … that they can help people they know,” he said. “And then it also helps the elders of our community see that our youth are willing and very capable of helping and making an impact.”
He urged the state to preserve trades programs. Other students argued arts programs deserve the same support.
But, amid budget constraints, arts and trades are “the first things to go,” said McCurdy Charter School Director Sarah Tario, one of a few school leaders who sat in on the presentation.
“I think that first and foremost we really need to listen to our kids,” she said. “They know what the formula is to improve education, and we need to do our best to take that into consideration as we’re making programs.”
