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Danielle Gonzales

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Danielle Gonzales
Image of Danielle Gonzales

Nonpartisan

Candidate, Albuquerque Public Schools Board of Education District 3

Albuquerque Public Schools Board of Education District 3
Tenure

2022 - Present

Term ends

2025

Years in position

3

Predecessor
Elections and appointments
Last elected

November 2, 2021

Next election

November 4, 2025

Education

Bachelor's

George Washington University, 2001

Graduate

University of Notre Dame, 2003

Personal
Birthplace
Farmington, N.M.
Profession
Education nonprofit management
Contact

Campaign website

Campaign Facebook

Personal LinkedIn

Danielle Gonzales is a member of the Albuquerque Public Schools Board of Education in New Mexico, representing District 3. She assumed office on January 1, 2022. Her current term ends on December 31, 2025.

Gonzales is running for re-election to the Albuquerque Public Schools Board of Education to represent District 3 in New Mexico. She is on the ballot in the general election on November 4, 2025.[source]

Biography

Danielle Gonzales was born in Farmington, New Mexico. She earned a bachelor's degree from George Washington University in 2001. She earned a graduate degree from University of Notre Dame in 2003. Gonzales' career experience includes working in education nonprofit management, and as a fourth grade teacher. She has been affiliated with the Truman Foundation, Education Leaders of Color, Latinos for Education, MomsRising, Moms Demand Action, and the Albuquerque Giving Circle.[1]

2025 battleground election

See also: Albuquerque Public Schools, New Mexico, elections (2025)

Ballotpedia identified the November 4 general election as a battleground race. The summary below is from our coverage of this election here

Four seats on the Albuquerque Public Schools school board in New Mexico are up for election on November 4, 2025.

Albuquerque Journal's Noah Alcala Bach wrote, "The balance of power between the two primary factions that make up the Albuquerque Public Schools board is on the ballot this November."[2]

Eight candidates are running in the four districts. Those candidates are:

To read more about each candidate's policies, click here.

Albuquerque Journal's Noah Alcala Bach wrote, "Historically, the local teachers union, the Albuquerque Teachers Federation, and the metro’s business community power players, the Greater Albuquerque Chamber of Commerce and the local chapter of NAIOP, a commercial real estate organization, have been key organizations in the battle for power on the APS board."[5]

In 2021, three candidates aligned with the business community and one candidate backed by the teachers' union won.[6][2] Of the seven-member board, three candidates are affiliated with the business community and three are affiliated with the teachers' union. One is not affiliated with either side.[5]

The Albuquerque Chamber of Commerce endorsed Gonzales, Jackson, Ams, and Martinez.[7] The Albuquerque Teachers Federation endorsed Betzen, Bowman, and Wood-Hegne. The union did not endorse a candidate for District 5.[8]

Another issue in the election is the performance of the district's superintendent, Gabriella Blakely. The candidateshave been divided on her performance since her appointment in 2024. Gonzales, Jackson, Ams, and Martinez all expressed varying degrees of support for her. Betzen, Bowman, and Wood-Hegner were more critical of her tenure. Laurent said it was too early to judge her performance, but that the board's decision to extend her contract in 2025 was made too quickly.[2]

The Albuquerque Public Schools district covers Bernalillo County and Sandoval County. In the 2024 presidential election, Kamala Harris (D) won both counties with 59% of the vote and 52% of the vote, respectively.[9]

In addition to school board elections, Albuquerque is holding elections for mayor, city council, and municipal bonds. To read more about other Albuquerque elections, click here.

Elections

2025

See also: Albuquerque Public Schools, New Mexico, elections (2025)

General election

The general election will occur on November 4, 2025.

General election for Albuquerque Public Schools Board of Education District 3

Incumbent Danielle Gonzales and Rebecca Betzen are running in the general election for Albuquerque Public Schools Board of Education District 3 on November 4, 2025.

Candidate
Image of Danielle Gonzales
Danielle Gonzales (Nonpartisan)
Silhouette Placeholder Image.png
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Rebecca Betzen (Nonpartisan)

Incumbents are bolded and underlined.

Candidate Connection = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey.
If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey.

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Withdrawn or disqualified candidates

Endorsements

Gonzales received the following endorsements. To send us additional endorsements, click here.

2021

See also: Albuquerque Public Schools, New Mexico, elections (2021)

General election

General election for Albuquerque Public Schools Board of Education District 3

Danielle Gonzales defeated Jinx Baskerville, Ali Ennenga, and Lucas Gauthier in the general election for Albuquerque Public Schools Board of Education District 3 on November 2, 2021.

Candidate
%
Votes
✔
Image of Danielle Gonzales
Danielle Gonzales (Nonpartisan) Candidate Connection
 
41.5
 
7,609
Image of Jinx Baskerville
Jinx Baskerville (Nonpartisan) Candidate Connection
 
38.7
 
7,090
Image of Ali Ennenga
Ali Ennenga (Nonpartisan)
 
12.0
 
2,207
Silhouette Placeholder Image.png
Submit photo
Lucas Gauthier (Nonpartisan)
 
7.7
 
1,416

There were no incumbents in this race. The results have been certified. Source

Total votes: 18,322
Candidate Connection = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey.
If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey.

Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team.

Campaign themes

2025

Ballotpedia survey responses

See also: Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection

Candidate Connection

Danielle Gonzales has not yet completed Ballotpedia's 2025 Candidate Connection survey. Send a message to Danielle Gonzales asking her to fill out the survey. If you are Danielle Gonzales, click here to fill out Ballotpedia's 2025 Candidate Connection survey.

Who fills out Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey?

Any candidate running for elected office, at any level, can complete Ballotpedia's Candidate Survey. Completing the survey will update the candidate's Ballotpedia profile, letting voters know who they are and what they stand for.  More than 23,000 candidates have taken Ballotpedia's candidate survey since we launched it in 2015. Learn more about the survey here.

You can ask Danielle Gonzales to fill out this survey by using the button below or emailing gonzalesforaps@gmail.com.

Email

2021

Candidate Connection

Danielle Gonzales completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2021. The survey questions appear in bold and are followed by Gonzales' responses. Candidates are asked three required questions for this survey, but they may answer additional optional questions as well.

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I was born and raised in NM, attended Albuquerque Public Schools and graduated from Valley High School. I worked my way through college and earned my Bachelors in Political Science and Spanish at The George Washington University and Masters of Education from the University of Notre Dame. I have dedicated my life to improving education, as a teacher, an advocate, a funder, a policy expert, and as a national non-profit leader, because I have seen firsthand how education can change a person’s life. For more than 20 years I have focused on supporting students of color and low-income students, English learners, and now I run a non-profit focused on supporting urban district leaders and educating policymakers. I am a parent/guardian to four school-aged children. I serve on multiple nonprofit boards. I bring parent perspective, education policy expertise, and board governance experience. I have established strong relationships and partnerships with education leaders across the nation and the state. I know what it takes to improve large districts and I cannot sit on the sidelines during this historic moment. I am ready to step up to serve my hometown as a member of the APS Board for District 3.
  • Recovery - responding to the impacts of the pandemic, economic recession, racial unrest, and related stress is my top priority. The district is fortunate to have an influx of federal funds through the American Rescue Plan (ARP) that come with a lot of flexibility in allowable uses. The challenge will be to balance reactive response to technical fixes, such as PPE, air filters, and capital outlays, along with more innovative and proactive investments that will drive improvements for the long-term. Because the dollars are one-time, the district should not spend on things that will need sustained funded, making investments in much-needed personnel additions (such as counselors, social workers and other mental health specialists) challenging.
  • Academic performance for the district has been stagnant since 2011 and is lower than comparable large-city school districts nationwide. The district must find a way to turn this around and improve academic outcomes.
  • Our schools and school district must regain the trust of the community. Extended school closures, debates over masks and vaccinations, have contributed to higher levels of stress and lower levels of patience. District leaders – the board included – have the opportunity not just to “build back better" when it comes to infrastructure, but must also focus on building back trust.
I am always been committed to improving education and have made that my life's work. I also know that the promise of the American Dream, that through hard work and education, one can achieve success, has never been real for far too many, but especially so for people of color. In this ongoing moment of crisis, all paths to recovery – for civics and democracy, work employment and the economy, and for racial healing – run through our schools. Our society overall is at an inflection point and there is an opportunity to change the way we do schooling to align more to research on child development, to focus more on equity and agency and to foster greater belonging and mobility. Children and families don't experience issues in siloes though. There is a direct relationship between increased opportunity in life and access to safe and affordable housing, to reliable and high quality child care, to paid leave and living wages, to reliable healthcare and nutritious food, and to family planning and reproductive health care and choice, and more. I am passionate about ensuring multiple public policy issues are addressed and funded so all can have the resources and services they need to succeed.
My grandfather, Agapito E. Silva, was a WWII veteran and a Prisoner of War (POW) who was held captive by the Japanese for 3.5 years. I was very close to him growing up and deeply influenced by his commitment to service, community, family, faith and perseverance. My grandpa advocated for veterans for us whole life. Because of his example, I have been called to serve to improve my community and do my part to make the world a better place.
Honesty, transparency, justice, commitment and humility. I believe the purpose of government is to provide services and supports for the community and society as a whole, and especially for those who cannot help themselves.
Expertise in urban school leadership and improvement strategies, given my work with the Aspen Institute’s urban district networks.

Knowledge of federal and state education policy, including allowable uses of federal funds, given my decades of work in state and federal education policy.

A commitment to equity, and experience privileging the voices and perspectives of stakeholders furthest from opportunity.

I have significant management and board governance experience, which includes both creating and managing budgets, making challenging personnel and strategic decisions, development of strategic plans and metrics and tracking and managing toward goals.

I work to stay up to date on the latest research in education and child development and would also bring that knowledge to bear, including new findings in neuroscience and the science of learning and implications for schooling.

I am also a parent/guardian to four school-age children – and will bring perspective from day-to-day experiences navigating pandemic learning, including child stress, anxiety and mental health struggles and experience with mental health providers and other systems of support.
Bless Me Ultima, by Rudolfo Anaya. It was the first book I read where I saw my self, my culture and background represented. It is also a masterful piece of storytelling that blends mysticism, religion and traditional heroes journey.
The primary job of a school board members is to develop policy and provide oversight and effective governance of the school district. The board also manages, evaluates, and when needed, replaces the superintendent.
My constituents are the students and families served by Albuquerque Public Schools. Because of the relationship between schooling and broader outcomes, schools also play a role in overall community and individual wellbeing. All residents of the community - even those without children - are my constituents.
I am driven by the commitment to ensure that all students succeed. I will filter decisions through the lens of what is good for students, and what is supported by research, evidence and data. I will prioritize listening to those stakeholders that are closest to the issues: students, families, and educators. I will recognize the assets and strengths that are brought by students of color, students from low-income backgrounds, LGBTQ students, English learners, and students with learning disabilities and differences – so solutions meet their needs first. I will lift up and celebrate the district’s success and not shy away from the challenges or the hard debates. I will bring examples of lessons-learned and promising practices from other districts and education improvement efforts from across the state and across the country. I will work for community schools, to strengthen learning, leverage resources, and support families. I will work with senior district leadership to enable an excellent instructional strategy, provide training and supports for teachers, and direct resources to where they're needed most.
I plan to proactively seek input from students, parents/guardians, educators, school leaders, community and business leaders, through PTA/PTOs, community-based organizations, the APS family engagement collaborative and through in-person and virtual listening sessions within District 3. I will also establish a relationship with each of the principals of the District 3 schools to hear from them about the issues that are most important for their school. I will be responsive to constituent outreach and requests. I will also target student groups and student leaders to hear the voice and perspective of students.
A teacher corps that reflects its students helps close achievement and opportunity gaps. Having teachers that look like them help reduce the likelihood of students of color dropping out of school, and make it more likely that they will go on to college. There are a variety of approaches, partners, technical assistance providers and programs to help meet this goal. We can advance programs (such as 'grow-your-own') that improve pathways to teaching for high school students, college students and career changers who identify as people of color. We can strengthen partnerships with tribal colleges and Hispanic Serving Institutions. We also need to collect data on teacher and teacher candidate diversity, along with demographic data from pre- and in-service teaching programs so we know more about who is serving where, and why they leave.
Research shows that young people learn best when they feel safe, supported, and a sense of belonging. So we need schools that prioritize these things. When young people experience stress, their brains release hormones that get in the way of them taking in information. We need to make sure our educators understand the science of learning and development so they can foster safe and supportive environments, so they can value and develop student sense of identity, and partner with families and communities. Additionally, the students furthest from opportunity rarely have access to grade-level or rigorous academic content, so we need better instructional materials and aligned training and instructional supports. Student learning is negatively impacted by social determinants so we need partnerships to ensure that students are fed, housed, and have access to physical and mental health services.
Good teaching recognizes that every child can learn and focuses on building critical thinking and problem solving skills, along with core competencies in reading and math. To measure this we need a balanced assessment system that includes teacher-developed and curriculum aligned assessments, along with large-scale assessments. We also need to measure the school climate or learning environment to track the student experience. This can be done with student, family, and educator surveys, as well as by looking at data like attendance, and on exclusionary discipline. We also need to measure inputs: which students have access to technology, qualified teachers, food and healthcare, quality instructional materials, safe buildings and passages, as well as functional HVAC systems. In this pandemic era, we also need to be tracking which students have access to synchronous vs asynchronous learning. I also know that far too many students are subject to low-expectations and below grade-level content. We need instructional guidance and coaching and common curriculum to sure every student has access to grade-level content. As educators demonstrate skills, competencies and effectiveness, they ought to have more freedom.
Before we expand curriculum, we need to ensure we are effectively implementing curricula to ensure each child has access to grade-level content. We also must expand access to, and quality of, culturally and linguistically responsive education and materials.

Community schools are an innovative solution to improve school effectiveness and enhance the lives of communities and families. Our public schools are our greatest resource and should serve as hubs for our entire community. We need an intentional, and focused district-wide strategy that reimagines and supports our schools to enable mutually beneficial relationships with families, neighborhood residents, businesses, and organizations to collectively improve the well-being of our students.

Dual enrollment programs and strategies allow students to earn college credit while still in high school and in some cases, allow them to earn an Associates degree at the same time as their high school diploma. These programs help students and families save money, and also help business and industry align academic programs to industry need.

High quality pre-k for all ensures that all children are ready to learn and also helps young families get to work, knowing their children are safe and supported.
As a board member I would be responsible for reviewing and approving the school district's budget. Right now, we have an influx of funding from the federal government and from the state, which I would allocate toward integrated approaches to academic acceleration and overall child wellbeing, including mental health supports. I would review the district's budget with attention to services and programs targeting the students furthest from opportunity, working to ensure that resources are directed where needed most. I will talk to students, families, and school leaders to determine their funding needs and priorities and consider those perspectives when allocating funds and balancing the budget. I would also use my position to advocate the legislature for more funding when needed.
Every day, families send children to school placing their trust in the hands of teachers, principals, and other school staff, hoping that their children will be safe and able to learn and thrive. As a parent myself, I understand the stress of wanting your child to be safe. I also know that many of these conversations are politically charged and partisan in nature in part because they implicate race, gun access, and personal freedom and are deeply emotional and high-stakes. My policies will be driven by science and evidence about what works and doesn't; and attentive to communication, making sure key stakeholders - namely families and students stay informed.

Evidence suggests that improving school climate, or the overall character or “feel” of the school, can support safer schools, reduce bullying, and improve family engagement.

There is not a strong evidentiary base for "hardening schools, such as arming teachers, increasing the number of School Resource Officers (SROs), or adding metal detectors.
First and foremost, I would allocate some of the federal relief dollars to mental health supports. This includes school-based mental health services, increasing the number and training of social workers, school psychiatrists and behavioral and social-emotional support specialists.

We need to make mental health part of every one's job through more training and support. So I would increase training for educators and change principal job descriptions so they are held accountable for the overall environment of their school, not just academics.

Educators and other school-based staff have experienced high levels of stress and secondary trauma over the last year and a half and also need more relief and supports.
Technology will play a critical and unavoidable role in society and in schools. In addition to providing devices to students, we should also integrate educational programs that help young people understand how to engage a productive digital citizens online. There are organizations and technical assistance providers that special in this.
During pandemic times, schools must focus on the comprehensive needs of children - the whole child. The demands of the 21st century and pandemic recovery will require a new approach to education, one that addresses students' comprehensive needs and ensures that each young person and adult feels safe, respected, supported, and a true sense of belonging. It is time to shift from a focus on narrowly defined academic test scores as the only measure of success, to a richer and more robust focus on social, emotional, physical and mental well-being. We also must ensure that every family has access to a high-quality pre-k experience.

Additionally, we need to follow science, including the recommendations of the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and other public health experts. This means masks in schools and vaccinations until we are able to reduce community spread of COVID.
I will visit all of the schools in my district and speak directly to the school-based parent organizations. I will also provide my contact information and be responsive to all inquiries. I will host listening sessions to hear the input of families. I will partner with community organizations and others who are already engaging and communicating with parents.

Note: Ballotpedia reserves the right to edit Candidate Connection survey responses. Any edits made by Ballotpedia will be clearly marked with [brackets] for the public. If the candidate disagrees with an edit, he or she may request the full removal of the survey response from Ballotpedia.org. Ballotpedia does not edit or correct typographical errors unless the candidate's campaign requests it.

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External links

Candidate

Albuquerque Public Schools Board of Education District 3
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    Footnotes

    1. ↑ Information submitted to Ballotpedia through the Candidate Connection survey on September 6, 2021
    2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 Albuquerque Journal, "Stage is set for Albuquerque Public Schools board race," October 14, 2025
    3. ↑ KUNM, "TUE: Early voting begins, candidate for APS board suspends bid to represent District 3, + More," October 7, 2025
    4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 Albuquerque Public Schools, "Nine Candidates File for APS School Board Seats," August 28, 2025
    5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 Albuquerque Journal, "Here are the candidates for Albuquerque Public Schools Board of Education," September 2, 2021
    6. ↑ SourceNM, "Money won seats on Albuquerque’s school board," November 4, 2021
    7. ↑ Greater Albuquerque Chamber of Commerce, "CHAMPIONS OF EDUCATION:  Chamber supports 4 candidates on ballot for Albuquerque Public Schools Board," October 4, 2025
    8. ↑ Albuquerque Teachers Federation, "Albuquerque Educator Unions Endorse APS Board Candidates," September 2, 2025
    9. ↑ Associated Press, "New Mexico President," accessed October 15, 2025
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