New Mexico Biliteracy Panel

Celebrating Expertise. Advancing Biliteracy. Transforming Education.

What is the New Mexico Biliteracy Panel?

The New Mexico Biliteracy Panel is a group of leading educators, researchers, and advocates dedicated to advancing bilingual education and biliteracy across our state. As part of the Transform Education NM coalition, these experts bring decades of experience in teaching, policy, and research to ensure our literacy policies reflect New Mexico’s rich linguistic and cultural heritage.

Our panel members serve as trusted voices for the media, policymakers, and community leaders, offering informed perspectives on how to create a literacy system that works for all learners, especially multilingual and Indigenous students.

Why the Biliteracy Panel Exists

New Mexico’s public schools serve one of the most linguistically and culturally diverse student populations in the country:

  • 75 percent of students are Hispanic or Native American

  • Over one third speak a language other than English at home, including Spanish, Keres, Diné, Tewa, and more

Despite this diversity, too many education policies have centered monolingual approaches to literacy, leaving multilingual students underserved. The Biliteracy Panel was created to:

  • Center bilingual expertise in state education conversations

  • Elevate voices of leaders with deep knowledge of multilingual learning

  • Inform policy and practice so literacy instruction is culturally responsive and linguistically affirming

  • Support public engagement by making expert perspectives accessible for interviews, testimony, and publications

By embracing biliteracy, New Mexico can create a uniquely New Mexican model of literacy instruction, one that affirms students’ identities, strengthens academic outcomes, and prepares them for a multilingual future.

Meet the Panel

Dr. Susana Ibarra Johnson

Assistant Professor in Bilingual Education and TESOL, New Mexico State University
Dr. Ibarra Johnson is a nationally recognized leader in bilingual education and co-author of The Translanguaging Classroom: Leveraging Student Bilingualism for Learning. Her career spans roles as a professional development specialist, researcher for WIDA, and director of bilingual multicultural education at Bernalillo Public Schools. She currently serves as vice-president of the Association of Bilingual Education New Mexico (ABENM), NABE Western Region Executive Board Member, and AERA Bilingual Education Research SIG Communication Chair. Her research focuses on translanguaging pedagogy in bilingual and English language development contexts, rooted in her own experiences as a bilingual learner and teacher.

Michael Rodríguez

Executive Director, Dual Language Education of New Mexico (DLeNM)
A native of Pecos, NM, Michael Rodríguez leads DLeNM, an organization known for its high-quality professional development and its annual hosting of La Cosecha, the nation’s largest dual language conference. With over 15 years as a school administrator, he helped design and run three dual language programs in Santa Fe and Albuquerque. As DLeNM’s Executive Director, he guides a team of educator-trainers supporting schools, districts, and state agencies nationwide in developing sustainable dual language programs that empower multilingual learners.

Adrian Sandoval

Director, Center for the Education and Study of Diverse Populations, New Mexico Highlands University
With more than 30 years of experience, Adrian is a seasoned bilingual educator, leader, and program developer. At NMHU, he directs the Acequia and Land Grant Education Project, the Ben Lujan Leadership and Public Policy Institute, and Engaging Latino Communities for Education (ENLACE). His work centers on building strong family-school partnerships, uplifting youth leadership, and valuing students’ cultural and linguistic gifts as assets. He has coordinated student leadership institutes for La Cosecha and the Association for Bilingual Education of New Mexico and is researching the decline of bilingual teacher education programs in New Mexico as part of his doctoral studies.

Dr. Elisabeth Valenzuela

Associate Professor in Bilingual/TESOL Education and Chair, Department of Teacher Education, New Mexico Highlands University
Executive Director, Association of Bilingual Education New Mexico (ABE NM)

Dr. Valenzuela is an associate professor and department chair at New Mexico Highlands University. She also serves as the Executive Director of the Association of Bilingual Education New Mexico. Her 25-year career in public education includes roles as a first-grade bilingual teacher, instructional coach, principal, assistant professor, and Education Administrator at the New Mexico Public Education Department’s Bilingual Multicultural Education Bureau.

While at the Public Education Department, she created the Spanish Language Development and Spanish Language Arts task force to review and adopt standards aimed at strengthening bilingual multicultural education programs in the state. Currently, Dr. Valenzuela is focused on revitalizing a strong bilingual education program at NMHU to prepare skilled and compassionate bilingual teachers. As Executive Director of ABE NM, she advances advocacy, leadership, professional development, and research initiatives to support bilingual education in New Mexico.

Resources & Publications

Fact Sheet: The Harmful Impacts of SB242

During the 2025 legislative session, Senate Bill 242 was introduced as a sweeping overhaul of literacy instruction in New Mexico. While framed as a measure to improve reading outcomes, SB242 would have banned balanced literacy from teacher preparation programs, imposed rigid “Science of Reading” only approaches, and implemented compliance mandates without clear evidence of success for our diverse student population.

The New Mexico Biliteracy Panel opposed SB242 because it:

  • Imposed a one size fits all literacy model that ignores the needs of multilingual and Indigenous students

  • Restricted academic freedom and faculty autonomy in teacher preparation programs

  • Failed to address critical data gaps on the impacts of Science of Reading on bilingual learners

  • Overlooked the court mandated obligations from the Yazzie/Martinez ruling to build a culturally and linguistically responsive education system

Instead, the Panel advocates for a homegrown literacy approach that draws on local research, values biliteracy as an asset, and prepares teachers to meet the needs of all students in New Mexico.

[Download the SB242 Fact Sheet PDF →]

Contact the Panel

Members of the New Mexico Biliteracy Panel are available for interviews, speaking engagements, and consultation.
For media or speaking requests, please contact: Meryl Chee, Communications Director [meryl@transformeducationnm.org].