As a grandmother and mother, Michelle understands that New Mexico’s children are the key to New Mexico’s future. Michelle has prioritized education throughout her career in public service, fighting to ensure that every New Mexico student—no matter where they live or what their background is—has access to the high-quality education they deserve. From day one in the governor's office, Michelle worked tirelessly to deliver an education moonshot, investing over $1 billion into New Mexico’s education system. Michelle will never stop fighting for New Mexico’s students, parents, educators, and schools.
A product of New Mexico’s public schools system, Michelle is dedicated to uplifting every student, parent, educator, and school in New Mexico. Michelle led the effort to ensure every New Mexico school has the resources they need to serve their students. She made New Mexico the first state in the nation to create an innovative way to send investments to schools with concentrated poverty and doubled the number of community schools. Michelle partnered with sovereign nations, tribes, and pueblos to make long-awaited investments in education in tribal communities and because of Michelle’s efforts, New Mexico is now leading the nation in setting aside funds for bilingual and multicultural education.
- Doubled affordable pre-k enrollment
- Delivered historic educator pay raises and thousands of hours of instructional and professional development
- Invested over $1 billion in New Mexico’s schools
- Expanded tuition-free college and certificate programs for all New Mexicans
- Incorporated parent and community feedback at every turn
In her campaign for governor, Michelle promised to be a champion for New Mexico’s educators–and she has done just that. Under Michelle’s leadership, New Mexico teachers received the most significant back-to-back raises for educators in 15 years–successfully reducing teacher vacancies by nearly 25% in 2019. This year, Michelle delivered a 7% salary increase and a base pay increase for every New Mexico educator, making New Mexico teacher wages the highest in the region. Michelle also put tens of millions of dollars toward scholarships for educator training programs, helping more than 3,000 New Mexico teachers this year alone.
New Mexicans have long called for universal pre-k and affordable child care — and Michelle delivered. Michelle expanded affordable, high quality child care to thousands of New Mexico families and secured permanent funding to ensure New Mexico will continue to provide families with affordable options for their children’s education for decades to come. Michelle established universal pre-k for four-year-olds and greatly expanded pre-k for three-year-olds.
Michelle made New Mexico a national leader in guaranteeing 100% tuition-free higher education for all New Mexico students. Michelle is eliminating barriers to higher education like student debt and burdensome fees that keep too many students—no matter their age, background, or family situation—from getting the training and the job they want and deserve. By creating and funding the Opportunity Scholarships and restoring the promise of the Lottery Scholarships, Lujan Grisham expanded scholarships for 2-year, 4-year and certificate programs, helping tens of thousands of New Mexico students attend college for free.
