New Mexico Education Secretary Arsenio Romero Resigned Effective Immediately

NM Public Education Dept. Secretary Arsenio Romero resignsPhoto by2nd Life Media Alamogordo Town News

The New Mexico Public Education Department Secretary Arsenio Romero resigned on Wednesday, Aug. 28, the Office of the Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham announced in a news release.

Romero’s resignation is effective immediately, according to the news release.

About a week ago, New Mexico State University (NMSU) officials announced that Romero was one of five finalists for the position of president of the university.

New Mexico State University has been in the search for a new leader since March, and the leader of the state’s education agency is one of the five finalists announced Monday.

Arsenio Romero, secretary at the Public Education Department, has the potential to return to his alma mater, where he’s served as a regent and taught as a professor.

Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham appointed Romero to the state’s top education spot in February 2023, the fourth person to hold the position during her tenure as governor. With Romero stepping down, an interim secretary will be appointed, and any perman replacement requires state senate confirmation.

The other four NMSU president finalists hold leadership positions in higher education around the country.

They include:

• Valerio Ferme, vice president for academic affairs and provost at the University of Cincinnati.
• Brain Haynes, a vice chancellor for student affairs at the University of California, Riverside.
• Monica Lounsbery, a dean at the college of health and human services at California State University in Long Beach.
• Neil MacKinnon, a professor in the school of Public Health and former provost at Augusta University.

NMSU, the state’s land-grant university, has just over 14,700 students at its Las Cruces campus, and more than 21,000 students across the state, according to the 2023-24 headcount.

The University has been without a permanent top leader since April 2023, when Chancellor Dan Arvizu resigned just months before his contract expired in June. The board of regents agreed not to renew his five-year contract in December 2022.

Arvizu was overseeing the whole NMSU system and the main campus as both chancellor and president, taking on the title after President John Floros stepped down in March 2022.

Arvizu oversaw a tumultuous period at the university. This included the cancellation of the basketball season over instances of hazing, where former players settled with the school for $8 million. Former employees filed multiple lawsuits against the university under his leadership, for allegations including retaliation for investigations in racist and sexist pay disparities.

Arvizu’s base salary was $500,000, but could be as high as $650,000 if he reached incentive goals.

The board declined to hire any of the five finalists picked in the first search for a replacement, opting to restart the search in March 2024.

In March, the board appointed interim President Mónica Torres, who formerly was president at Doña Ana Community College. She replaced interim President Jay Gogue, a former NMSU president the board appointed to operate the university in the wake of Arvizu’s departure.

The university is holding finalist interviews in August, with a scheduled campus visit in September, according to the scheduled process. The NMSU Board of Regents, which governs the university, anticipates announcing the new president at the end of September.

For more information, the university is posting updates and bios of the candidates on the https://nmsu.edu/president-searchpage.