Sherry Robinson is an award-winning, longtime New Mexico reporter and editor. She began her newspaper career in Grants in 1976 and subsequently worked for the Gallup Independent, Albuquerque Journal, New Mexico Business Weekly and Albuquerque Tribune. She is the author of four books.
In a year with lots of money to spend, legislators tried to lift up two long-neglected groups of educators – educational assistants in schools and higher education’s adjunct faculty members.
Only educational assistants got any love. Their bill sparked a sense of urgency and flew through hearings and floor sessions with nary a hiccup, while three measures directed at adjunct faculty died.
The situation of educational assistants is easier to understand. They’re not aides or helpers. Schools need them, rely on them, but don’t pay them a living wage.
New Mexico has 5,467 educational assistants in public schools. They usually work the same hours as teachers, but because their pay is so low some work second jobs or need Medicaid and food stamps. As the ones who often interact with students who have disabilities or behavioral disorders, they’re bitten, punched and kicked in the line of duty.
By law, their minimum pay is $12,000 ($6 an hour), although the average is about $22,000, according to the Legislative Educational Study Committee. However, 28% earn less than $20,000. That’s probably why we have a 33% vacancy rate for these folks.
The bipartisan House Bill 127, a priority of the American...
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