WNMU is requesting $8 million of capital outlay funding for construction of a new home for the New Mexico Center of Excellence for Early Childhood Education, which is dedicated to educating and training New Mexico’s early childhood educators. The new facility will be built on university-owned land off of N. Alabama St., behind the St. Mary’s Academy building in Silver City. The first phase of construction was funded with 2023 outlay from the Legislature and through the 2024 General Obligation Bond. The additional funding requested of the Legislature would allow expansion of pre-K programs and student services. At 12,500 square feet, it will house five classrooms, a kitchen, administrative offices and a reception area, and it will be powered by rooftop photovoltaic cells in keeping with the university’s plan to be carbon-neutral by 2030. Outside on the property will be a toddler playground, a school-age playground, an amphitheater and an outdoor classroom, and nearby is...

As Black History Month begins, Western New Mexico University recognizes the work of one of its distinguished alums, Anita Scott Coleman (1890-1960). Coleman, who was born in Guaymas, Mexico, grew up on a ranch outside Silver City. Her father came west from Florida as a Buffalo Soldier, a term given to Black men who enlisted to fight Native Americans after the Civil War. Coleman graduated from what was then known as New Mexico Normal School in 1909. She and a classmate were the first African Americans to graduate from the school. Even as a student, Coleman’s literary talent was recognized by her peers. In “The Normalite,” the school newspaper which at that time also served as a de facto yearbook, the editors included a short, tongue-in-cheek poem about each of the graduates. The poem about Coleman reads, “Annie, so good in the literature class / Found out in geometry, it was hard to pass.” Following a short career as a teacher, Coleman went on to publish short...

Anyone who has recently needed home maintenance or repair knows that New Mexico needs more skilled workers.  According to the New Mexico Department of Workforce Solutions, that need is only expected to grow.  The statewide need for workers in construction and extraction industries is expected to grow by nearly 14% between 2022 and 2032, and in that same period, the labor market in installation, maintenance and repair is expected to grow by more than 12%. Western New Mexico University is already addressing these shortages by training skilled workers through its Community and Workforce Development programs—including programs in welding, electrical and construction technology—but the university has plans to significantly expand its capacity through a new Career Technical Education Center. The new facility would offer trade training programs that tie directly to employment opportunities in southwestern New Mexico, especially those available in the four-cities region that...

The latest collection of artifacts donated to the Western New Mexico University Museum comes to the university from just up the road. The materials are from La Gila Encantada, a Late Pithouse era Mimbres site located in Little Walnut Canyon on property owned by the Archaeological Conservancy. Archaeologists consider the Late Pithouse period to be approximately AD 550-1,000. According to WNMU Museum Director Dr. Danielle Romero, the site was excavated in 2004 and 2005 as part of an archaeological field school run by Dr. Barbara Roth of the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. The site is a small one, said Romero, with nineteen pithouses and a small two-room field house. A pithouse is a mostly subterranean structure that Mimbres people inhabited before the Classic Era, when they began building larger above-ground pueblos. “We think they are all autonomous pithouses,” Romero said of Gila Encantada. “At some of the larger pithouse sites, we see evidence of extended households,...

Last fall, Mariachi Plata de WNMU had an opportunity to travel to Jalisco to be featured at De Tecalitlán Los Sones, the world’s most prestigious festival of mariachi. The group attended the festival by invitation of its organizers. “They heard of us through the mariachi that we work with from Guadalajara, Mariachi Estrella de Mexico,” said Director of Mariachi Plata de WNMU Bryant Chaffino. For the past two years, WNMU has partnered with Estrella de Mexico for El Son de la Gila, the annual mariachi conference held on campus in June. The festival is eleven days long, according to Chaffino, and each day several mariachi groups perform on a stage in the town square. All of the other performers were professional mariachis; Mariachi Plata de WNMU was the only university group to perform at the prestigious festival. The setting of the festival was itself inspiring, said Chaffino. While Tecalitlán is a small town in terms of population, it has had an outsized influence on...

Toward the end of fall semester, WNMU Nursing students and faculty had a chance to learn more about the legislative process and professional advocacy at the New Mexico Nurses Association Student Day at the New Mexico Legislature. “The purpose is to teach the students to advocate,” explained Associate Professor of Nursing Margaret Fran Driver. “They had students from every university in the state come to Santa Fe.” Driver led the trip along with Assistant Professor of Nursing Angela Cox. Joining them were two Level 3 nursing students, Ariana Medina and Catherine Fierro. The experience was a full-day affair, said Driver. “They had a morning session where they talked about the legislation that would be coming up in the next legislative session,” she noted. “And then we walked over to the Roundhouse and watched the Legislative Health Committee.” At the Roundhouse, the students and faculty then had a chance to talk with several legislators, as well as with the...

Western New Mexico University will be closed Monday, January 20, 2025 in observance of Martin Luther King, Jr....

A longtime member of the WNMU community is stepping down following a distinguished career of service to the university. Barbara Flores’ most recent position has been as Program Manager, Library Operations/Special Events. She has also worked in Academic Affairs, the Registrar’s Office, Athletics, the Western Institute of Lifelong Learning and the President’s Office. A number of Flores’ significant memories of her time at the university stem from her service on Staff Senate. Flores, who was one of original senators when Staff Senate was created in the 1980s, was instrumental in changing the pay structure for staff. “Staff used to get paid once a month,” explained Flores. “I did some research and called all the other universities to find out how they were paying their staff, and everyone was getting paid twice a month. So I contacted the university president, and he agreed to move to twice a month.” Flores also played an important role in encouraging the...

The Higher Learning Commission (HLC) has informed Western New Mexico University that the university has been reaccredited for the next 10 years. The accreditation decision was made following a rigorous peer review, evaluation and site visit, according to WNMU Accreditation Liaison Officer Connie Rooks. HLC is a private, nonprofit institutional accrediting agency. HLC Accreditation validates the quality of the institution and is essential for the university to continue offering federal financial aid. Rooks said that the site visit, which occurred in October 2024, went smoothly. “We were really excited about the type of feedback we were getting,” she said. At this visit, a delegation of individuals with extensive experience in higher education came to the campus to speak with students, faculty, staff and administrators. The path leading to the site visit was rigorous, said Rooks. While the accreditation process is always ongoing during the ten-year cycle, she said,...

Every day, students in Puerto Palomas, Chihuahua, and Columbus and Deming, New Mexico, navigate two countries, two languages, and two distinct educational systems. For these young U.S. citizens living in Mexico, crossing the U.S.-Mexico border to attend school is just another part of the routine. But for the faculty members from the WNMU College of Education, a recent visit to this border community was an eye-opening experience—one that revealed both the challenges and importance of bilingual education in the borderlands. The day trip to Deming, Columbus and Palomas was organized by Professor of Education and Associate Dean of the College of Education Alexandra Neves. It was prompted by a desire to better understand the students that the university is educating and to better understand the students that education majors will have in their classrooms. Many WNMU education students come to the university from Deming, said Neves, and the university also has dual enrollment...