Fire Up Your Feet and Active Schools Fundraising: A Winning Combination!

McDonald's is excited to announce its new partnership with New Mexico PTA! McDonald's and NMPTA's goals of supporting and advocating for education and
children in our state are aligned in many ways.

Like NMPTA, McDonald's promotes literacy and education for its employees and its customers. McDonald's Archways to Opportunity education program supports its employees - many who are high school students - with tuition assistance to earn high
school/college degrees and learn English as a second language. McDonald's local owner/operators contribute thousands of dollars throughout our state to local schools in their communities through sponsorships, food donations, and more each year.

Did you know that McDonald's menu has many wholesome and nutrition-minded options? In fact, 80% of menu items are 400 calories or less. McDonald's is committed to providing wholesome eating choices for children. All Happy Meals include apple slices, seasonal fruit or yogurt, milk and preservative free chicken or 100% beef.

As part of our new partnership, McDonald's is committed to assisting NMPTA schools in
a number of ways including:

• McTeacher's Nights where local NMPTA members and schools raise money to benefit
• their schools + school programs.
• * Ronald McDonald visits to schools to share anti-bullying, leadership and "character
• counts" messaging.
• * Literacy promotion for kids throughout the State, with an upcoming event in March!
• * Gold sponsorship of the NMPTA Statewide Convention.
• * Support of the NMPTA Reflections Program with McDonald's tray liners in ALL NM
• restaurants featuring student artwork.

McDonald's is looking forward to meeting the NMPTA members over the next few months. More exciting news to come but in the meantime, please follow our Twitter
account at @McD_NewMexico + restaurant Facebook pages by searching for 'McDonald's @' and the address/location of your nearest McDonald's in the search bar.

New Mexico PTA has partnered with Learning Alliance of New Mexico to conduct Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) forums around the state. The ESSA forums provide an opportunity for communities to voice their thoughts and ideas regarding quality education within our state. The feedback provided from the forums is compiled in a report which will be sent to the Public Education Dept. Most recent forums were held at Alice King Community School, Gadsden School District and Jemez Mountain Community PTA.  NMPTA thanks the LANL Foundation for their funding support of this project.

  Thank you to the Noyce Foundation and New Mexico Out of School Time who sponsored lunch and joined us on February 21st for the NMPTA/NMOST Legislative Day in Santa Fe. Thank you to our guest speakers; Michael Weinburg- Thornburg Foundation, Aubrey Dunn-NM State Land Commissioner, Armelle Casau- STEM Up Project NMOST, Pamela Pereyra- NM Media Literacy NOW and May Sagbakken- NMOST who educated us on the legislative process, current bills, the State Land Office, advocacy and how to engage our legislators.

If you were unable to attend Legislative Day there is still time for you to advocate in support of or oppose bills impacting education within our state. We invite you to visit nmlegis.gov to learn more about the bills being proposed at the Roundhouse. Contact your Representatives and Senators to share your thoughts. Your legislators want to hear from You!

Land of Enchantment PTA is pleased to announce four scholarship opportunities sponsored by Mountain America Federal Credit Union. Please see the attached scholarship applications for more information and how to apply.

• Scholarship to attend National PTA Conference in Las Vegas
• Scholarship for Educator
• Scholarship for Parent-Guardian
• Scholarship for Student