What is Amira?

Amira is an AI-powered reading assessment tool that the New Mexico Public Education Department (PED) mandates for all K-2 (optional for 3rd grade) students in public schools, including Santa Fe Public Schools. Here's how it works:

• Your child reads aloud into a device during the assessment

• Amira records your child's voice, uses AI to analyze their reading, and generates a score

• Students who are deemed not proficient are required to take the assessment monthly, in addition to the beginning, middle, and end of year assessments

• That means some children as young as 5 years old are having their voices recorded by AI multiple times a year

Why should parents be concerned?

Amira's privacy policy states that voice recordings may be shared with third-party service providers for hosting, analytics, or technical support. Amira also states it may use data "to customize content within the Resources, to improve the Resources' content and functionality and to develop new products and updates." In plain language, that means this company can harvest your child's voice data, use it to build and improve its commercial products, and sell those products for profit. Your child's biometric data becomes a corporate asset. 

The problems go beyond the company:

• A New Mexico Legislative Education Study Committee (LESC) May 27, 2026 policy brief reported NM lacks "statewide procurement standards for AI tools, student data privacy requirements specific to AI, and a formal evaluation process for AI education tools." 

• LESC staff found that "it is unclear what vetting processes and stakeholder input PED used to implement Amira." 

• SFPS has no formal board policy on AI use in classrooms, and at least one AI tool used in the district (Brisk) has recommended that teachers upload students' federally protected Individualized Education Programs (IEPs) into its platform

• Amira has drawn criticism from teachers and lawmakers for struggling to understand students with accents or speech differences, meaning children in a district like SFPS risk being mislabeled as not proficient at the very start of their school careers, because of how an algorithm processes their voices.

How to exercise your rights.

Your child does not have to have their voice recorded by AI in order to be assessed in reading. Alternatives already exist within the Amira system:

• A paper format of the assessment is available

• A non-verbal version that uses only keyboard inputs is available

• PED's guidance confirms that local administrators can disable the retention of student voice recordings

• Amira's website states that districts "may choose to disable audio collection entirely." 

Submit a written request to your child's principal and/or teacher before the first assessment window of the 2026-27 school year. Your request should state clearly that: 

• You do not consent to your child's voice being recorded or retained by Amira 

• You are requesting your child be assessed using the paper format or non-verbal version

• You want written confirmation that your request has been processed. 

Do not accept a verbal assurance. Get it in writing.   

Schools may tell you that PED expects a 95% participation rate on mandated assessments and that opting out could put the school at risk. You are not refusing the assessment. You are refusing to let your child's biometric data be collected by an AI system that the state's own legislative staff say was deployed without a formal vetting process, without statewide privacy standards, and without meaningful transparency about where the data goes or who profits from it. 

What is happening at the state level?

The Legislature is studying screen time and AI in schools right now. LESC's own staff have identified the same gaps parents are concerned about: 

• No privacy standards for AI tools

• No formal vetting of Amira before it was deployed statewide

• No requirement that districts adopt AI policies 

Parents, advocates, and policy professionals have submitted formal questions to LESC asking the committee to recommend:

• Enforceable privacy safeguards

• An edtech contract audit

• A standardized opt-out process

• A moratorium on new AI tool deployments until the study is complete 

Every parent who asserts their rights in SFPS this fall strengthens the case for the Legislature to act. This is how policy changes.