82,000 licenses are not 82,000 teachers
The gap between licenses held and people employed looks like 42,000 missing teachers. Read the data and it's mostly something else.
Articles
Reporting & editor's notes.
Writing from the New Mexico Impact Lab — what we found in the records, and how to use the data.
New Mexico trains teachers it doesn't keep
The state holds licenses for 82,000 teachers but employs fewer than half — and much of the unused pool already taught here.
The shift to entry-level credentials
New Mexico's teaching force is tilting toward entry-level and alternative licenses — the teachers who leave fastest.
Paid from the bottom up
From 2012 to 2019 the state lifted its lowest teacher salaries fastest, compressing the pay ladder from the bottom.
The subjects New Mexico can't staff
The state holds 11,800 English endorsements and 138 in computer science — and 34 of its largest districts have almost no CS teachers at all.
Introducing the New Mexico Impact Lab: 48,000 bills, now searchable
Two databases go live: every state bill from 1996–2026, and a lobbyist-to-employer index — and what the records already show.
Where New Mexico bills go to die
Most bills die in committee — and two money committees are the biggest bottlenecks of all.
Who works the New Mexico Legislature
A small corps of contract lobbyists carries dozens of clients each through the Capitol.
Thirty years of dead bills
Fewer than one in five bills becomes law. The fate of 48,533 bills, and who introduces the most.
How to navigate the data
A quick guide to searching the bills and lobbying databases — filters, expanding records, roll-call votes, and checking against the source.