Rita A. Marquez Elementary

Rita A. Marquez Elementary is a K–5 school on Main Street in the rural community of Anton Chico, New Mexico, serving just 51 students — one of the smallest elementary enrollments in the state — as part of Santa Rosa Consolidated Schools, a district that itself ranks 77th of 87 New Mexico districts.

Performance is currently near the bottom of the state. In 2025-26, 27.27% of students were proficient in English language arts, 6.64% in math, and 15.62% in 5th-grade science — every subject below both the district and New Mexico averages, with math the sharpest weakness at roughly a quarter of the state rate. The school ranks 339th of 346 elementary schools statewide. What makes this so striking is how recent and total the reversal is: two years earlier, the school scored 59% in ELA and 37% in math, above both its district and the state, and ranked in the top 10% of New Mexico elementary schools, 43rd of 413. That is a drop of about 32 points in ELA and 21 points in math in a single year, and it shows up across every tested grade rather than in one class. Family income is not the explanation — free or reduced-price lunch has been at or near 100% throughout, including during the school's best year.

The closest comparison is Valley Elementary in Ribera, 19 miles away, serving 56 students with a similarly disadvantaged population under West Las Vegas Public Schools. Valley's 2025-26 ELA proficiency of 36.36% is about 9 points higher than Rita A. Marquez's, though Valley's math and science results are not publicly reported, so no comparison is possible there. Rita A. Marquez's 10:1 student-to-teacher ratio is favorable by almost any standard, which suggests class size is not the issue. With only 51 students, single-year numbers can swing sharply, but this decline spans three subjects, several grade levels, and two consecutive years of softening — and the school's own recent record shows it can perform well above the state average.