Over jeers, Alma principal delivers upbeat report

This story originally misstated the number of students who graduated, and has been corrected.

On May 31, Alma d’Arte Charter High School graduated 35 students, comprising 100 percent of the senior class, an event celebrated by principal Adam Amador at a special meeting of the charter school’s governing board on June 3.

Amador addressed the school’s proficiency rates as well as corrective action plans under a notice of breach from the state’s charter school authority, and highlighted other positive developments for the arts-based charter school following his first school year on the job: The opening of a market for student-produced works, ballet folklórico and jazz programs, workshops and talks with visiting artists, field trips to Albuquerque and to New Mexico State University and the awarding of an “innovation zone” grant from the state Public Education Department to boost vocational programs and graduate student-artists prepared to work in their fields.

Yet, once again, community members attending the meeting at the school’s auditorium called for Amador and the board members to resign, and some heckled at times during the business meeting. During public comments several called for resignations, with some accusing the administration of retaliatory behavior for community members concerned about the school’s academic performance, governance and the welfare of students on campus. Some of those present were affiliated with a community group, “Save Alma,” that has organized on Facebook and regularly attends board meetings.

A bitter rift between critics of the school including graduates, parents and former teachers and the school’s governance council and top administration showed no signs of healing.

The state Public Education Commission issued a notice of breach of the school’s charter in April citing concerns respecting governance, financial oversight, academic performance, attendance and the school leaders’ relations with students and their families. Several commenters at Monday’s meeting speculated that the PEC might take action to strip the school of its charter. Amador said he had not been advised of any steps toward that, which he said would require a formal process.

The board passed a list of action items taken at four public meetings at the end of 2023 that the state Department of Justice advised had not been properly announced under the state’s open meetings law, with the recommendation that they cure the violations by ratifying actions taken at those meetings in a proper session.

Meanwhile, Amador said meeting notices, agendas and supporting documents were now being posted regularly on the school’s website, which was recently redesigned. A page devoted to governance council business includes a pull-down menu with meeting attachments, including a draft budget for 2024-25 that was approved Monday night by the board.

The school’s business manager, Chris Masters, said the school was making progress toward climbing out of a budget hole he attributed to previous administrations setting budgets based on overly optimistic projections of student enrollment, even as that enrollment declined. As a public school, Alma d’Arte receives state education dollars based on enrollment.

Masters and Amador also referred to a $20,000 embezzlement scandal at the school that led to criminal indictments of a former principal and other staff in 2020, with Amador saying the funds had never been fully recovered.

Masters reported that the school finished April with $172,000 in the bank prior to payroll, and that his budget was based on conservative estimates of enrollment, and included cuts to some contracted services as well as reductions in staff, with additional cuts to come if enrollment declined further as of the 40-day count next school year. The budget estimates $1.47 million in operational costs against $1.54 million in revenue. The board unanimously approved the budget.

The most recent academic performance data is derived from testing during the 2022-23 school year, prior to Amador’s arrival, for grades 9 thru 12. Of a total enrollment of 121 students that year, 10 percent showed proficiency in math; 35 percent in reading; and 16 percent in science. The graduation rate was 72 percent that year.

Year-over-year growth in math was 5.4 percent, and the graduation rate grew by 4 percent. However, reading proficiency declined that year by 9.9 percent.

Amador expressed frustration with the process of addressing the PEC’s concerns, telling the board he was subject to strict deadlines for providing documentation but that new requests were repeatedly added without him being informed promptly. The board unanimously approved his corrective action plan, with board member Martin Swafford recommending the business manager later present a financial map for how the budget would fund the required actions.

Among its other actions, the board — ignoring shouts and heckles as it conducted business — approved a calendar for the coming school year as well as Amador’s strategic plan.