Advocates for special education celebrated March 9 after Gov. Michell Lujan Grisham signed a bill creating the Office of Special Education within the NM Public Education Department.
“This is a very exciting bill for those of us who have worked in special education our entire lives,” sponsor Sen. Mimi Stewart said during the bill’s Senate floor debate. Stewart, an Albuquerque Democrat, is a lifelong special education teacher.
The bill does four main things. It consolidates and modernizes state special education law into one clear Special Education Act aligned with IDEA requirements, codifies a dedicated office led by a deputy secretary, strengthens statewide consistency of individual education plans and makes clear that gifted programs are separate.
In 2018, a New Mexico court ruled in Yazzie/Martinez v. State of New Mexico that state was failing to meet its obligation to provide “the right to be college and career ready” to all students.
Then in 2025, another judge ruled the state still had not complied and laid out remedial steps the Public Education Department needed to take by the end of the year.
Supporters said the establishment of an Office of Special Education would help New Mexico’s efforts to comply with that aims to provide equal education to all students, especially those who are low-income, Native American, English language learners and students with disabilities.
Sen. Pat Woods, R-Broadview, was the only no vote. “I just hear that over and over and over, that we are requiring more and more reports to go into PED and we’re not doing more and more to fund more special education teachers,” Woods said. “We’ve got to figure out how to generate more special education teachers before we can do a better job with special ed.”
The changes may be technical but will help the state do a bette job of special education, Stewart suggested.
“Improvement won’t happen overnight, but we’re raising standards and moving New Mexico forward,” Lujan Grisham said in an Instagram post after signing the bill.
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Christian Lucero is in his final semester at the University of New Mexico, from which he will graduate in May with a degree in Journalism and Mass Communications (Multimedia concentration) and an English minor. Christian enjoys spending time with his girlfriend Nicole, his cat Miss Lady Ma’am and his family. He likes to golf and hopes to become a special education teacher and baseball coach at an Albuquerque high school after graduation.
