Otero County LULAC supports public Education - Stop the Sacramento Charter School

Otero County LULAC supports public Education. STOP THE SACRAMENTO CHARTER SCHOOL -NM Public Education Commission

Meeting THURS *JULY 11 * 9-11am

ESTRADA CIVIC CENTER, Alamogordo 

Reasons to reject the proposed charter school in the Alamogordo Public School District!

O The pre-application for the Charter school in January 2024 to the NM Department of Education is deficient:

- The application shows a closed committee of Chamber of Commerce insiders:

- No Hispanic representation

- No African American representation

- No LGBTQ representation

- No representation for Disabled nor Special Education

- No representation for Economically challenged

O The Public has not been involved in any of the application process, was not given any information in regards to it, and would not even have known about a proposal in progress without coverage by AlamogordoTownNews.org.

O Finance - A Charter school will take an estimated $1.5 million from existing AHS programs per year rising to $2.6 Million by Year 5.  A charter is a publicly funded school without the transparency of regular public schools.

O 62% of Charters fail within 5 years in small rural communities, but additional damage is done to students during that time in both the failed charters and in the public schools, due to depleted funding issues.

O Charter schools have a higher percentage of administrative expenses billed to the public than public schools, and charter teachers are historically paid less than their counterparts.

O A Charter school will pull 156 students out of AHS. They could pull up to 25% of the students from AHS. The 2024 graduating class is only 302 students. The impact to AHS will be detrimental, with layoffs and shuttered programs; the result of losing $1.5 millions to the charter.

O Site - The Charter school site is set for Mesa Verde. The site is hard to reach for inner city children, and there will be no busing.

O General - Nationwide, charters lose 24% of their teachers each year, double the rate of traditional public schools.

- 25 years and some 6,000 schools nationwide, charters still on average produce results that are less or just equal to those of the public schools they set out to out-perform.

- About 200 charters close per year, not just for academic shortcomings, but for flawed governance or leadership, a drop in student demand, or financial errors.

- Charters inadequately serve children with special needs. Charters suspend children with disabilities at a higher rate than public schools, and there have been many cases of inadequacy due to a lack of resources, experience and insensitivity.

O Charters are more racially segregated than traditional public schools. NAACP boosted the No on Charters program, calling for a national moratorium on expanding charters until there was less segregation and better accountability and transparency.

O Representation - For this Charter school to move forward, a publicly elected board of oversight is necessary.

O Equal minority representation is needed, not just token representation, but equal representation; to include economic representation.

- LULAC Council 8105 Joanne Vullo President