Taos education briefs: Pueblo, budget, bullying and more

The Taos school board held its regularly scheduled meeting Feb. 14. All board members were present. Here’s a rundown of some of the issues, policies and initiatives that were discussed.

Taos Pueblo

Board members Mark Flores II and Jason Silva discussed their conversation with members of the Taos Pueblo government, including Gov. Ruben A. Romero. The conversation was the follow-up to a request by Pueblo government officials for more communication with and involvement in the Taos Municipal School District (TMSD).

“We need short-term and long-term goals so we can keep moving in a good direction … so we’re not meeting again in two years with [no changes],” said Flores.

TMSD Superintendent Dr. Lillian Torrez told the board the administration is working on five issues concerning the request from Taos Pueblo for more collaboration, including broadening a Pueblo-centric curriculum at the high school, creating a special bilingual diploma seal for Taos Pueblo students, reinstating professional development that is Taos Pueblo specific (rather than dealing with Native American identity and issues generally) and keeping communication open (via quarterly meetings).

Furthermore, the administration is finding a way to legally and technically share performance and growth data on Taos Pueblo students with the tribe’s education branch.

One lingering request — a voting spot on the Taos school board — will take far more work to make a reality, as board members anticipated at a 2016 meeting between the two governments.

Because Taos Pueblo does not have enough tribal members to constitute a voting district outright, Flores said creating that voting seat would mean redistricting, a legislative change (which, with half of the current legislative session over, would have to wait until another meeting of the Roundhouse) or encouraging a Taos Pueblo member to run in the next regularly scheduled school board election.

Silva proposed stepping down from the school board if the tribe had a qualified replacement for him ready. Silva said that between taking care of two aging parents and going back to school, he was unsure about his ability to commit to the board over the rest of his term. Silva has been absent from board meetings more often than the four other board members.

“I won’t step down until the budget is finalized. I posed that question, but it doesn’t seem like anyone is too interested at this time,” Silva said.

Jim Sanborn, board president, said that while Silva’s offer to vacate his seat was “nice,” “I for one very much value your participation on the board” and encouraged Silva not to do so.

Flores and Sanborn were just re-elected to their seats Feb. 7 in uncontested races.

Art auction

In order to sustain and expand the Visiting Artists program and other arts education within the district, TMSD will hold a live art auction Feb. 25 at the Stables Art Gallery. The schools are auctioning off works donated by famous Taos artists, including Larry Bell, Ed Sandoval, Jocelyn Martinez, Margaret Nes, Thom Wheeler, J.D. Challenger, Jim Wagner, Michael Vigil and Pat Woodall.

Budget

Torrez expects the district won’t be getting reimbursed for about $275,000 each month for the rest of the school year because of budget cuts enacted by the Legislature. The cuts were part of a solvency package signed by the governor to fill a gaping hole in the state’s budget. Part of the cuts came from a “sweeping” (take up to a certain threshold) of school districts’ savings accounts.

“Every school needs to have a cash balance for the unforeseen things that come up,” said Bobby Spinelli, the TMSD finance director. “In 23 years [of managing school district finances], the biggest unforeseen crisis that ever came up was this year – not because something happened to our facility or we had to hire a bunch of teachers. It’s because the state took from our budget. … That’s kind of amazing. If these districts didn’t maintain a cash balance, then what would the state do? The money wouldn’t be there to take.”

Spinelli also criticized the governor’s rhetoric of calling cash balances “slush funds” for administrators. “It’s an insult,” he said. “Any dollar they take out of a cash balance will certainly affect a classroom. ... They can’t do this to education in this state and expect education to survive.”

Torrez said some districts hit hardest by the cuts are looking at cutting the current school year or enacting furloughs (layoffs). She added that TMSD is in a healthier position because the district had more money in its cash reserves than many others. She said her goal was avoiding cutting days from the calendar or laying off staff.

Sanborn again implored Torrez to communicate with the board about activating the “Taos army” of engaged citizens ready to make calls and lobby their legislators, which has been a key tactic in regards to school budget cuts during the last two legislative sessions.

Bullying data

Four students at Taos High School gathered and analyzed data on the mental health and “self-harm” of their peers in seven Taos schools.

According to Serena Savage, one of the students involved in the project, the origin of their investigation started with several suicides by Taos-area youth in the last year. “It hit home,” she said.

The project was called “How Do You Affect Others?” and used a four-part survey administered to students in grades five through 12. Their findings show that key transition years — entering and exiting middle school, primarily — have a correlation with suicidal ideation, bullying and tendencies to self-harm.

Members of the group said they learned a lot just by administering the survey. Not only did younger students have a hard time grasping the concept (self-harm) and vocabulary used in the survey, but most students also had a hard time talking about the topics. That insight fueled another key focus of the project: community awareness.

The group argued that beyond doing a quantitative analysis of mental health, part of the project was meant to help young people feel more comfortable talking about mental health and suicide, which they hope would also embolden them to reach out for help if and when they need it. The group is working with other student-led efforts focused on preventing suicide to reach more students.

Rocky Mountain Youth Corps has collected similar data for several years. Board members encourage the group to align surveys (in structure, vocabulary and methodology) with established surveys in Taos County in the future.

Future meeting

The next regularly scheduled Taos school board meeting will be held March 7 at 6 p.m. at Taos Middle School, located at 235 Paseo del Cañon West. Students, parents, teachers and community members are invited to speak during the public comment portion of school board meetings.