Here's which APS schools will not receive Title I funding next year

Fifteen Albuquerque Public Schools and three charter schools will not receive Title I funding next school year after the district changed the threshold to qualify.

The district will now require a school to have at least 60% of enrolled students living in poverty to receive federal funds. The current requirement is 50%.

The change is “driven by the school district’s concerted effort to improve student outcomes,” according to district spokesperson Martin Salazar, who added that 92 APS schools will continue to receive Title I funding along with 18 charter schools.

“The Board of Education really tasked the administration with improving outcomes of students, and so in order to do that, we do have to change the way we’ve been doing things, and that includes resource allocation,” said Melanie Blea, APS’ executive director of state and federal programs.

She emphasized that all APS schools will still receive some form of federal and state funding.

Eight elementary schools, five middle schools, one kindergarten through eighth grade school, and one high school will no longer receive Title I funding.

“Students aren’t going to be served right and, and really APS has made this decision and not really included the people that it’s going to affect,” said Robert Baade, president of the Governing Council for South Valley Academy, which is set to lose Title I funding.

He added that while state funding may help fill the gap left by Title I funds, the school is awaiting the governor’s signature on bills from the legislative session to determine how that funding can be used.

“This money normally would have been guaranteed, and now, all of a sudden, it’s being taken away without any hold harmless period for them to create some adjustments,” Baade said.

Blea said schools are working hard to understand what it means for them.

“People who work at schools see their school, and we are tasked with looking at the district as a whole,” Blea said. “We’re working to make sure that the communication is in place so that everyone understands the ‘why’ behind the decision, and then working with individual schools as needed.”

In total, Title I makes up $37.9 million of APS’ $2.37 billion budget.

“In order to move the needle, we really do need to saturate certain schools with higher poverty percentages with Title I funding,” Blea said. “So we’re going from really stretching the dollar to every possible school to making sure that the dollar has more of an impact at the schools that it does go to.”