By Lynn Janes
The Cobre Consolidated School Board held a special meeting on June 9, 2025. Board members in attendance included Gabriella Begay, Gilbert Guadiana, Emmarie Heredia and Angelina Hardin. Interim superintendent Randall Piper also attended. David Terrazas and did not attend.
The board approved the agenda with some changes in the order of the agenda items.
Board members reports
Begay had moved this item in the agenda to introduce the new interim superintendent. "We're glad to have you on board." He had come out of retirement to fill this position. He had done six years with the Lordsburg municipal schools and two years at Truth or Consequences schools. He also did many years with Regional Education Cooperative (REC). The rest of the board in attendance welcomed Piper.
Guadiana gave a little bit of a report on the conference (New Mexico School Board Conference) some of them had attended. One of the sessions he had attended was for people that had been on a school board for some time. The group had people with a lot of experiences and discussion. Something they said they did would be to meet with the superintendent on an occasional basis which has not been something done at Cobre. During the interviews Piper had said he would like to have those meetings.
Guadiana spoke to finances and needing to have the audits caught up. They would not be able to build a new school until those audits have been brought up to date. One thing the district has been excelling at recently in test scores and some as much as 40 percent.
Begay had attended the conference as well. She had not attended the veteran board member training but instead attended the new board member training even though she has been on the board for about two-and-a-half years. She liked Ruidoso Schools and their approach to governance that is student focused. Half of their agenda addresses students directly. They have created a six-year plan she wanted to share with the board and they had a presentation on the use of AI in education.
Heredia applauded the special Olympics. She loved seeing their faces during their routines
New business
Cory Gropp, Cobre High School principal, and Senator Gabriel Ramos presented awards for excellence. Ramos said the board had tough decisions to make but today they would celebrate the state champions in basketball, cheerleaders, softball and powerlifting. Ramos said it had been privileged to be on the senate floor when the Cobre cheer team won, and they announced it. It had sent chills up his spine. He had also been able to umpire a lot of the softball games. Ramos said he had prepared a long speech but just told them how proud he was of all of them. Ramos continued to praise their accomplishments and how they had conducted themselves at the state championships.
The awards came from the New Mexico state senate, 57th legislature, 2025 and recognized the girls' state softball champions, girls' basketball district champions and girls' state cheer champions. Ramos read out each team member and presented them with the award.
Begay interrupted and wanted to acknowledge that while they had been at the New Mexico School Board conference that one of the students accepting an award had also won one of the scholarships. Guadiana had brought the check with him to present to her.
Ramos also had academic excellence awards for Isenya Silva, Aaliya Salas, Hunter Soliz, Ayzik Jimenez, and Analisa Tovar.
Public input
Several Cobre consolidated schools employees had signed up for public input. Begay read the long list rules for public input.
Suzanne Chavira came to request a potential restructuring of the proposed salary schedule. She had understood it had been finalized at the last finance committee meeting and had just been made of aware of it. This is why she used public comment to voice her concerns. After her review she asked that they reconsider the schedule for her current position. Principal and teacher salaries had been uniformly raised in a mandate by the Public Education Department (PED). For her position the district sets the salary and not the state. Her salary had not increased exponentially for the next year as the others had. She provided a handout explaining her story. When accepting the position, director of academics, she had every reason to expect the job would be a step up not only in position, but salary. She asked that the new schedule not be approved at this meeting.
Katelyn Church, director of technology, when offered this job by then superintendent Jeff Spaletta, he had promised her she would be making what she had her first year at her previous position of $85,000. If the salary schedule passes that the board have before them tonight, she would finally make that $85,000. She had come from a district of similar size, student population and rural area with a higher cost of living. After living here in Grant County for two years she felt like she had found where she belonged and cited the organizations, she has become involved in. She said she didn't have any intention to move. She did want to call their attention to several things that have led her to believe her value and support of the school district is higher than the districts value her.
Church had contacted the director of licensure for PED and had been told it would be the discretion of the district if they required her position to be licensed. Human resources had told her it would not be necessary, but the salary schedule requires licensure for a higher salary. This indicated to her that she would never qualify for a higher position. She went on to list the people that would be eligible for a higher salary, one being the dean of students with no experience. Because of not having a PED license she felt the district considers her a second class employee. "I hope I am mistaken in this assumption and the wording is just an oversight that will be corrected." Regardless of the decision she said she would continue to do her job to the best of her ability without hesitation. "I just would like to know that at the end of the month I have more to show for it than stress-induced tension headaches and an empty savings account."
Norma Ramirez, human resource coordinator, said she had come to them as a committed member of the district to express the growing concern shared among her colleagues. In the beginning of the 2023-2024 school year when a structural shift had occurred. Positions that had been titled as directors had been reclassified and rehired with the title of coordinators. Along with that change had come a significant salary reduction of approximately $30,000 annually. This change did not reflect a change in a reduction of responsibility. After stepping into these roles, they have performed the exact same duties as the director predecessors. On top of that they had taken on the burdens of correcting years of department noncompliance, developing, implementing and enforcing essential policies and procedures. In many cases rebuilding systems that had long been neglected. Spaletta had assured them that the salaries would adjust to align with their responsibilities but unfortunately with his abrupt departure that promise had not been fulfilled. When they compared their pay to similar sized districts Cobre falls significantly behind.
This creates a growing concern about retention and recruitment for the future. Ramirez said, "My request is not just about numbers but about fairness. This is not about creating division, it is about restoring balance."
Erica Luckhurst, special education coordinator, went over her licensure and pointed out some of the people she would be supervising would be making a higher salary than she would. This would be demoralizing and make a person feel undervalued. She had been here for all the changes made recently and had done them, so it makes it difficult to continue forward with the current structure. She asked the board to reconsider the salary schedule.
Finance committee report
Begay said they had met and reviewed all of the budget increases that would be coming up. They had also reviewed the third quarter financial statements, bills, salary schedules, stipend schedules and transportation contracts.
They had two finance committee meetings and posted the agendas. Begay said, "I was really discouraged to hear that you guys could not come talk to us." She read a statement concerning the salary schedules; "We want to take a moment to address the topic of salary schedules and increases for our central administration staff, as well as our custodians, maintenance teams, secretaries, paraprofessionals, and librarians. Each of these positions is incredibly valuable and essential to the daily operations of our schools. Without their hard work and commitment, our district simply cannot function. They are the backbone of our educational community, and their contributions deserve recognition and respect. We believe it is critical that we take a thoughtful and informed approach when it comes to compensation. While everyone across the district, except for teachers and principals whose salaries are set by the legislature through the public education department, we are recommending that they receive the mandatory 4 percent raise. We propose taking the next step with integrity and data-driven decision-making."
The finance committee recommendation will be to bring in a professional firm to conduct a classification and compensation study for the district. This study would assess the appropriate pay for each position based on the responsibilities, qualifications, and the district's demographics. Many other school districts in New Mexico and across the nation have taken this step to ensure they are compensating employees fairly and competitively. Begay added, "We need to allow the experts and the data to guide us."
Guadiana said this will be the first time the board has heard about this. Board involvement should occur along the way through the process such as an open meeting workshop. Now the board has heard it as a final product without any participation. "I think this has taken the position of the finance committee outside its parameters. It is not to make decisions for the board. I do agree with a study." The finance committee now has asked for approval on something that they admit may not have had the data to make a good decision.
Begay agreed with the salary set forth but, "I want to make it clear our finance committee meetings are open to the public and this was on the agenda twice." Tonight, they would be presenting this recommendation on behalf of the finance committee. She wished Terrazas had been able to attend to provide his input. "This was not just done in the dark of the night meeting. This was a discussion we had." The former superintendent Michael Koury had also been there.
Guadiana stressed again that the parameters of the audit committee and finance committee would be to serve as the people that develop recommendations but engage in conversation with the board to ensure that they move forward in a cohesive manner. "As a board member, I can't support it."
Begay said, "I respectfully disagree with you but it's your opinion, sir." She asked if anyone had any questions on the finance committee report.
Audit committee report
Heredia said they had met, and everyone had attended but Koury. Everything discussed had to be in executive session so she could not say more. She did add they had made a lot of progress. They will be meeting again to discuss some things that the audit committee had brought up. The committee would also like to see some previous audit data.
Guadiana asked how far along the 2023 audit had come and when it would be submitted to the state. He asked for a projected date. Heredia said they would discuss it at the next meeting.
New business
The board postponed the 1st reading of the policy advisory, graduation exercises and student discipline due to it had not been posted on the website.
Administrators – principals – directors reports
Luckhurst started with a listing of all the testing data. They had a lot of increases and a few decreases. The district made 100 percent compliance compared to the previous year of only 45 percent. She went over a program they started to help the staff and streamline the data. Luckhurst addressed the problem of chronic absenteeism of some students. It can lead to compounding learning gaps or a reduction in skills. If absenteeism is not addressed, they have a legal risk. "Students receiving special services are required to have equal access to education." Districts have had legal cases because of this. She continued to explain the possible problems and how they could address solving the issue. Luckhurst brought up what had been going on with title nine. Some changes in policy have been made and she will be watching it.
Ramirez had a personnel report for the month of May through June. She provided the board with a list of current vacancies and recently filled positions. A significant amount of her time has been dedicated to posting vacancies, routing incoming applications for review, filling open positions and conducting the full onboarding process for new hires. Onboarding includes many things. She said she has also been helping the certified staff with licensure renewal.
Ramirez continued with a long list of her duties. Earlier in the year she had shared with the board a transition to paperless onboarding system that allows for new employees to complete their documents online. While in theory it sounded convenient, it had not turned out that way. Many forms had been submitted incomplete and late requiring multiple follow-ups. Now new hires come into the office for a one-on-one onboarding session. This has improved accuracy and a more personalized experience. For people located out of town she has continued to send an online packet but with more detailed instructions. She had successfully recruited 21 new substitute teachers bring the total to 58 which last year had been a big problem.
Piper said he had something he would like her to consider. Currently they have been using a lot of contractors for some services. In many cases they had found contractors can save them a lot of money because they don't get the 30 percent in benefits. Although sometimes it seems the district pays the contractors more when in reality if looked at salary plus benefits that would cost more.
Gary Placencio, operations coordinator, said they had been really busy and have taken on some things usually contracted out to save the district money. He gave the example of the new school store and the flooring, shelves and other things they had done. He had been working side by side with the maintenance crew and said he has not been a paperwork guy. Placencio went over some of the other projects they would be working on.
Guadiana complimented him on the very quick turnaround for the ticket booths. "It was amazing." Begay complimented him also on this. She added they had been able to obtain some new vehicles for the maintenance department. Placencio thanked the board.
Action items
The board approved tabling the action items due to Heredia needing to leave and not having a full board to address the items. It also included the executive session. They agreed to have a special meeting the following week. The did approve the board meeting minutes listed on the agenda.
Meeting adjourned.
