Albuquerque Public Schools
Listening Session Brings Families and APS Leaders Together for ‘Sneak Peek’
From sampling new cafeteria recipes to touring electric buses, parents get a hands-on look at operational upgrades.
With the new academic year at Albuquerque Public Schools set to begin in just days, families gathered on July 27 at the Alice and Bruce King Educational Complex to get a preview of what lies ahead.
The APS Board of Education hosted a "Welcome Back to School" listening session that served as an open house for the district's future. The event offered attendees a "Menu Sneak Peek" of new cafeteria items, a chance to tour one of the district’s new electric school buses, and a facilitated discussion on how APS plans to modernize student services.
The interactive format was a direct response to feedback from previous sessions, where parents expressed a desire for more engagement and hands-on demonstrations. By inviting families to sample food and step onto one of the new electric buses, the district aimed to bridge the gap between administrative policy and classroom reality.
“We recognize that we’re doing some things, but we also know we need to grow,” said Antonio Gonzales, deputy superintendent of operations. “We need to be better tomorrow than we were today.”
Cafeterias
For many families, the most visible changes will be in the cafeteria, where a focus on nutrition and waste reduction is taking hold. All APS students are eligible for free meals under a state law enacted several years ago.
Marie Johnson, executive director of Food and Nutrition Services, showcased items that will debut this semester, emphasizing a shift toward more made-from-scratch food, with a new requirement that 50% of all meal components be freshly prepared. Menus will now feature “chef hat” icons to identify freshly prepared items, and culturally relevant meals will roll out monthly to align with heritage observances.
Johnson said 61 elementary schools are participating in the Fresh Fruit and Vegetable program through the U.S. Department of Agriculture this year, the highest number the district has had. And, she added, whole milk will now be offered as an option at both breakfast and lunch.
She also noted that her department is continuing to roll out salad bars at additional schools, following the successful launch at all comprehensive high schools last year. By mid-September, all APS middle and K-8 schools will have salad bars in their cafeterias.
But where will all the lettuce come from?
Central kitchen staff eventually plan to launch a hydroponic lettuce-growing operation — capable of producing over 100 pounds of greens in three weeks — to stock the salad bars.
Johnson also introduced the “Lunch Out of Landfills” pilot program. By using donated refrigerators, 12 community schools will be able to save pre-packaged items that would otherwise be discarded, creating a safety net for food-insecure students who can take them home at the end of the day.
Food and Nutrition Services provides 46,000 meals a day across 142 school sites and operates with a team of 580 staff members.
Buses
Outside the complex, the tour of an electric school bus offered a glimpse at the fleet’s technological future. APS will have 23 electric buses operating this school year.
Royce Binns, executive director of Transportation, also outlined a series of initiatives aimed at boosting safety and communication with families. The district is piloting a real-time tracking app that provides parents with live bus locations, a feature he noted will be particularly helpful during the winter months.
“Safety is our first priority,” Binns said. He noted that the district is also extending interior camera surveillance to all contracted bus carriers, ensuring consistent monitoring across the entire fleet and aligning with the standards of district-operated buses. He said his department is also looking at piloting optical readers that would notify families when a student boards and exits a bus.
The Transportation Department buses almost 32,000 students daily, traveling about 27,000 miles a day and about 4.5 million miles a year. The department operates with a staff of about 380.
Beyond the hardware and menus, the core of the evening was the facilitated discussion. Board members and staff joined families at tables to solicit candid feedback on what the district is doing well and where it needs to improve. Suggestions offered by families included improving the look of cafeterias to make them more welcoming to students, offering grab-and-go breakfasts as an option, and finding a way to get more students to ride buses to reduce congestion during drop-off and pick-up.
This feedback loop, fueled by a community survey that garnered over 4,100 responses, is becoming a staple of the current board’s strategy.
As the district prepares for the upcoming school year, APS officials hope these initiatives strike a balance between necessary operational changes and tangible improvements to the daily student experience. With another listening session already on the calendar for November, the district aims to keep the conversation — and the menu — fresh as the new school year unfolds.