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Public schools in New Mexico

304,084 pupils attended 879 public schools in New Mexico in 2024–25, in 154 school districts. Its districts spent $15,487 per pupil in fiscal year 2023, against $16,398 nationally.

New Mexico, 2024–25

304.1 thousand
Pupils
304,084
0.6% of the nation's public school pupils.
879
Public schools
Operational public schools in NCES’s 2024–25 directory.
12.9
Pupils per teacher
Over the 832 schools that report both counts; nationally 15.2.
99
Charter schools
10.8% of pupils.
$15,487
Spending per pupil
Current spending over fall membership, fiscal year 2023.

New Mexico over time

New Mexico's public school enrollment excluding pre-kindergarten fell by 36,396 from its peak in 2014–⁠15 to 2024–⁠25

Public school membership in New Mexico each fall, 2014–⁠15 to 2024–⁠25: all grades, and excluding pre-kindergarten, which is the line the title reads.

Membership is the October 1 count of pupils on a school’s rolls, as the state reported it to NCES.

Every year here reports its pre-kindergarten pupils.

National Center for Education Statistics, U.S. Department of Education — NCES Common Core of Data — public school membership by state, 2014–15 onwards

The figures behind this chart
New Mexico's public school enrollment excluding pre-kindergarten fell by 36,396 from its peak in 2014–15 to 2024–25. Public school membership in New Mexico each fall, 2014–15 to 2024–25: all grades, and excluding pre-kindergarten, which is the line the title reads.
School yearAll gradesExcluding pre-kindergartenPre-kindergarten
2014–⁠15340,365332,3618,004
2015–⁠16335,694327,1858,509
2016–⁠17336,263328,8337,430
2017–⁠18334,345324,6569,689
2018–⁠19333,537323,36310,174
2019–⁠20331,206320,71910,487
2020–⁠21316,840308,4678,373
2021–⁠22316,785307,5059,280
2022–⁠23315,023305,00510,018
2023–⁠24311,719300,83510,884
2024–⁠25307,110295,96511,145
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New Mexico's school districts spent $15,487 per pupil in fiscal year 2023, against $7,580 in 2005, in each year's dollars

Current spending per pupil in New Mexico, fiscal years 2005 to 2023: current spending over fall membership, summed over every district. In each year’s dollars, not adjusted for inflation.

Not adjusted for inflation: a dollar in 2005 bought more than a dollar in 2023, and this chart does not say how much more.

Each year is the release NCES has published for it: provisional for most, final for fiscal years 2019 to 2022. A final release revises the provisional one by well under 1% nationally.

National Center for Education Statistics, U.S. Department of Education — NCES School District Finance Survey (F-33) — every fiscal year in the current format

The figures behind this chart
New Mexico's school districts spent $15,487 per pupil in fiscal year 2023, against $7,580 in 2005, in each year's dollars. Current spending per pupil in New Mexico, fiscal years 2005 to 2023: current spending over fall membership, summed over every district. In each year’s dollars, not adjusted for inflation.
Fiscal yearPer pupilPupilsRelease
FY2005$7,580326,102Provisional
FY2006$8,086326,761Provisional
FY2007$8,635327,816Provisional
FY2008$9,068329,045Provisional
FY2009$9,437329,843Provisional
FY2010$9,383334,419Provisional
FY2011$9,006338,122Provisional
FY2012$8,805337,225Provisional
FY2013$8,992338,220Provisional
FY2014$9,706339,364Provisional
FY2015$9,705340,365Provisional
FY2016$9,654335,694Provisional
FY2017$9,838336,263Provisional
FY2018$9,557334,341Provisional
FY2019$10,173333,537Final
FY2020$11,289330,501Final
FY2021$12,026316,840Final
FY2022$13,190316,785Final
FY2023$15,487315,023Provisional
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Where New Mexico’s districts got their money, fiscal year 2023

Revenue of all 153 districts in NCES’s finance file, by source. Nationally, 12.6% came from federal sources.

State sources gave New Mexico's school districts 64.2% of their revenue in fiscal year 2023

Revenue of New Mexico's public school districts by source, fiscal year 2023, as a share of their total revenue.

National Center for Education Statistics, U.S. Department of Education — NCES School District Finance Survey (F-33) — newest fiscal year

The figures behind this chart
State sources gave New Mexico's school districts 64.2% of their revenue in fiscal year 2023. Revenue of New Mexico's public school districts by source, fiscal year 2023, as a share of their total revenue.
SourceRevenueShare of revenue
Federal$1.1 billion17.4%
State$3.9 billion64.2%
Local$1.1 billion18.4%
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The largest districts in New Mexico

By fall membership in 2024–25. Spending per pupil is the same district’s fiscal year 2023 figure from NCES’s finance file, where it reports one.

2 more columns on a wider screen

The 10 largest public school districts in New Mexico, 2024–25
DistrictPupilsSchools
Albuquerque74,792174
Las Cruces22,78239
Rio Rancho16,51920
Gallup12,80933
Gadsden11,73926
Santa Fe11,29929
Farmington10,76820
Hobbs10,12118
Roswell9,23022
Los Lunas8,20816

City, suburb, town and rural schools in New Mexico

34.4% of New Mexico's public school pupils attended city schools in 2024–⁠25

Pupils in New Mexico's operational public schools by the kind of place each school is in, 2024–⁠25: NCES's twelve locales grouped into city, suburb, town and rural.

National Center for Education Statistics, U.S. Department of Education — NCES Common Core of Data — public schools, newest full school year

The figures behind this chart
34.4% of New Mexico's public school pupils attended city schools in 2024–25. Pupils in New Mexico's operational public schools by the kind of place each school is in, 2024–25: NCES's twelve locales grouped into city, suburb, town and rural.
LocaleSchoolsShare of schoolsPupilsShare of pupils
City23827.1%104,61834.4%
Suburb8910.1%39,10912.9%
Town20823.7%79,04926.0%
Rural34439.1%81,30826.7%
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Colleges in New Mexico that take federal student aid

45 colleges in New Mexico are in NCES’s IPEDS universe for 2025–26: 28 public, 3 private nonprofit and 14 private for-profit. They enrolled 154,037 students over twelve months and awarded 7,831 bachelor’s degrees.

New Mexico elsewhere on the Factbook

  • Reported crimeCrime and justice

    Offenses reported to police by type, the trend, and the reporting coverage.

  • Most dangerous cities in New MexicoCrime and justice

    What each agency serving 25,000 or more reported, ranked. Agency populations overlap, so these do not add up to the state.

  • Prison populationCrime and justice

    People held under the state’s correctional authority, and the imprisonment rate. A different publisher counting a different thing.

  • Arrests by race, sex and ageCrime and justice

    Arrests as the FBI’s participating agencies reported them, with what the figures can and cannot support at the top.

  • Hate crimeCrime and justice

    Incidents reported to the FBI by bias motivation, as counts — the collection publishes no participation share, so there is no rate to compare states on.

  • Federal obligationsFederal spending

    What federal agencies obligated against a place of performance in the state, per resident and by agency.

  • Registered nonprofitsNonprofits

    How many organizations the IRS lists in the state, what they report as revenue, and which kinds of work they do.

  • Payments to doctorsHealth

    What drug and device companies reported paying doctors with a practice address in the state, and the largest recipients.

  • Immigration courtsImmigration and the border

    The EOIR courts sitting in the state, what they completed and still have pending, and how far apart their asylum grant rates are. The courts, not the state’s residents: a detention court hears cases from far outside it.

  • Farm program paymentsFarm subsidies

    What the Farm Service Agency paid through the state’s county offices, by program and by recipient. The offices that administered the payments, not a count of farms: a recipient addressed elsewhere is counted where they were paid.

  • Paycheck Protection Program loansPPP loans

    The PPP loans SBA guaranteed to businesses operating in the state, by county, with how many carry a forgiveness amount and how many were charged off. Loans, not businesses: a business with two draws is two loans.

  • Federal civilian workforceFederal salaries

    Federal civilian employees stationed in the state by agency and occupation, with the pay OPM publishes and the share it withholds.

  • The New Mexico Factbook entryAcross the Factbook

    Every measure the Factbook publishes for this state in one place, each with where it ranks among the others and the record it came from.

The immigration link above is EOIR’s courts, which sit in this state. CBP’s encounters are not by state and will not be: its sectors and field offices are areas of responsibility rather than a geography, and assigning them to states would be a claim the data does not make. Immigration and the border.

Sources

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data (CCD), 2024–25; “School District Finance Survey (F-33),” fiscal year 2023; Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS).

Data retrieved