Board hears expansion of school health, wellness and safety operations including weapons screening and new staffing dashboard

Cabinet leaders told the Las Cruces Public Schools Board about a suite of operational and wellness efforts intended to improve student access to health services, campus safety and administrative decision-making.

Nutrition and local-food partnerships were highlighted first. The nutrition-services team described La Semilla school gardens in more than 17 schools and said the districtarm-to-cafeteria efforts recently earned state and federal recognition. "That food then goes right into the cafeteria where they're preparing it, and it's right there from farm to table," a nutrition official said as staff described winning recipe pilots and plans to expand la carte and sampling programs.

On mental-health access, administrators said La Clinica de Familia now staffs school-based health centers and provides in-person behavioral-health providers at comprehensive high schools five days a week; the district cited city funding to add positions. Mayfield High School was singled out for a peer-support pilot and a $70,000 grant to create a wellness room; staff said 80% of Mayfield staff have received Mental Health First Aid training.

Safety measures included an overview of Evolve weapons-detection screening implemented at middle and high schools. Operations staff reported more than 1.5 million Evolve visits and an alert rate of about 0.09% this semester, and they reported a year-over-year drop in weapons incidents found in buildings (for example, middle-school weapon incidents dropped from 61 last year to five so far this year). "We think that's really good," operations staff said of the low alert rate and behavior change among visitors.

Finally, technology and HR demonstrated a new Power BI staffing dashboard that pulls overnight Synergy enrollment and student-group data to provide principals and departments live, granulated projections (including SPED and ELL counts) for equitable staffing and budget planning. The tool is already in use by principals and will be employed in upcoming staffing meetings.

Board members thanked staff for progress and asked for continued transparency about grant funding and long-term sustainability of programs.