Albuquerque Public Schools Board of Education held a Community Conversations event Thursday at Cibola High School to garner input from parents, teachers and students that will help chart future policies of the board.
School board president Yolanda Montoya-Cordova, who represents District 1, and vice president Peggy Muller-Aragon, who represents District 2 in Northwest Albuquerque, spoke to a crowd of about 75 parents, APS employees and students for two hours Thursday night.
“What we want to do is identify our priorities for the next several years. So this is going to be, we’re going to be looking at at least for the next five years, think about five years,” Muller-Aragon said. “So tonight’s event is going to be a two-way conversation between you, the community and us, your representatives. It’s our job to represent your district. We’re not here to represent our district; we’re here to represent your vision. So we want to make sure that we’re protecting your values and then we want to ensure that that is what the school district is doing.”
Attendees were separated into groups of five or six and asked to answer three questions:
- How do you want to describe an APS graduate in the future?
- What do you think APS students should know or be able to do to be successful?
- What are the things the school district should or shouldn’t be doing in pursuit of those priorities?
Tables spent 15 minutes discussing each question before providing feedback to Muller-Aragon and Montoya-Cordova.
Thursday’s event was the fourth Community Conversations event, a series designed by APS to engage with members of the community to understand what they want the future of the district to look like. There is an all-Spanish session scheduled for 6 p.m. Dec. 5 at Albuquerque High School. Members of the community are also asked to give their input online.
