Dr. Karen M. Trujillo Memorial Foundation donates $50,000 for Endowment Scholarship

New scholarship will support students pursuing a career in education

On May 17, 2025, Ben Trujillo, president of the Dr. Karen M Trujillo Memorial Foundation, presented a $50,000 check to The Northern Foundation. The donation establishes a new endowed scholarship for Northern New Mexico College students seeking an educational degree called the Dr. Karen M. Trujillo Memorial Scholarship Fund. 

"Northern is extremely proud to carry on the educational legacy of Dr. Karen Trujillo through the Dr. Karen M. Trujillo Memorial Scholarship Fund," said President Hector Balderas. "Dr. Trujillo's work as an educator, superintendent and policy leader in New Mexico has made a lasting change to the benefit of students across the state, and with this scholarship we are honored to support future educators in her memory." 

Dr. Karen Trujillo was a dedicated educator whose life was cut short when she was hit by a vehicle while walking her dogs in 2021. Early in her career she was a math teacher, a school principal and an adjunct professor at New Mexico State University (NMSU), where she became Director of K-12 outreach for the Alliance for the Advancement of Teaching and Learning with the College of Education. Trujillo started NMSU's Southwest Outreach Academic Research Lab and worked in multiple research and development roles for Math Snacks, a grant-funded program which developed a set of games and animations to help children understand math concepts and was named Interim Associate Dean for Research in NMSU's College of Education. She served as Secretary of the New Mexico Department of Education before returning home to become Superintendent of the Las Cruces Public School District. She was named one of USA TODAY’s Women of the Year honorees in 2022.

According to Ben Trujillo, who was Karen’s husband, there were two things she found especially frustrating. One was the “Karen” memes, in which Karen becomes a pejorative term for a middle-class woman perceived as entitled or excessively demanding. Her more fundamental frustration was seeing all the ways young people are discouraged from becoming educators. 

“I got to see her frustration with being a ‘Karen’ and with being told that education isn’t a good profession,” Ben said. “So that’s the whole idea of the foundation: let’s change the perception of what being a “Karen” could be and also let’s try to have some kind of positive impact on the number and quality of educators in New Mexico.”

As a passionate educator, Trujillo worked to counteract the second message. During her time at NMSU, she founded Educators Rising New Mexico, which cultivates a new generation of highly skilled educators by guiding young people on a path from middle/high school through college and into their teaching career. She secured funding from the New Mexico Legislature to initiate Educators Rising programs throughout the state. In addition to her institutional efforts to support the teaching profession, she personally influenced numerous people to pursue teaching careers and higher education. 

“So many people – more than I ever knew – came to me afterwards and told me, to a person, the reason I’m an educator is because your wife convinced me to do this. My future son-in-law became an educator because of her. Our lieutenant governor, Howie Morales, shared a story with me that he went back to get his PhD because of Karen,” Trujillo said. “She really believed in the value of education and how important teachers were. Obviously, we’re not ever going to be able to impact the way she would have, but that’s the reason for doing this.”

With a mission of “sculpting a brighter tomorrow for all of New Mexico’s children,” the foundation’s main thrust is to carry forward Karen’s legacy by creating endowed scholarships at the seven higher education institution in New Mexico with a teacher education program. The seed for that was planted during a Las Cruces Public Schools press conference immediately following Karen’s death, when Ben announced the family would be starting a scholarship in her honor and asked those who wanted to acknowledge Karen to send money to the New Mexico State University Foundation in lieu of flowers.

“Within a month, just over $30,000 had been sent, and there weren’t any donations above $1,000. So it was a lot of people doing that,” Ben said. The response was so overwhelming that Ben discussed with some friends the possibility of creating a more extensive scholarship fund. They quickly agreed and organized the first annual Dr. Karen M. Trujillo Memorial "Golfing for Educators" Scramble in September 2021, which raised $98,000 for endowments. 

While initial donations were directed to the NMSU Foundation scholarships, the group soon realized they could more effectively reach their goal of establishing endowed scholarships throughout the state by setting up their own foundation. The foundation will achieve its first milestone of endowed scholarships for every teacher education program as soon as they arrange a check presentation with the University of New Mexico, accomplishing in under four years a goal they had anticipated would take seven.  

The foundation has raised approximately $600,000 to date for endowed scholarship funds, with virtually all that money going directly to the endowments. With no paid employees, the board manages all the fundraising and distributes the scholarship funds. The board’s next goal is to increase their endowment funds to $1 million. 

“Thankfully my kids are very involved in all of this too, so hopefully we can continue doing it for a lot of years to come,” Trujillo said. 

The Dr. Karen M. Trujillo Memorial Foundation’s goal of “changing the narrative of being a Karen” is summed up in its hashtag, #BeAKarenNM, “to challenge you to be the Karen we knew.” The website elaborates, “Karen Trujillo lived by some pretty simple rules: Put our children first. Value our teachers. In competition and in life, always be a good sport that lifts others up instead of tearing them down.” The acronym “Be a Karen NM” stands for Believe in others, Empower, be Authentic, put Kids first, do All things with grace, be Resilient, be Exemplary, have No fear of failure, be Nurturing, be Mindful.”

In addition to $50,000 for the endowed scholarship, the Dr. Karen M Trujillo Memorial Foundation is donating an additional $1,000 so the first scholarship can be awarded in the Fall 2025 semester, without the need for interest to accrue on the endowment for the first award. Full time BA students seeking a degree in education who have completed two semesters with a minimum GPA of 2.5 are eligible. Applicants must be a New Mexico resident and demonstrate financial need. Preference is given to students who are former or current members of Educators Rising. If no students meeting the criteria apply, The Northern Foundation will reinvest the award into the endowment fund. 

The Dr. Karen M Trujillo Memorial Foundation is currently in the planning stage for the Fifth annual Dr. Karen M. Trujillo Memorial "Golfing for Educators" Scramble, which will coincide with what would have been Karen’s 55th birthday on Sept. 25. The Scramble will take place Sept. 26 – 27, 2025, at the NMSU Golf Course, preceded by the #BeAKarenNM Social from 6 – 9 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 25. 

Learn more about the Dr. Karen M. Trujillo Memorial Foundation at https://beakarennm.org/. Learn how to apply for this and other Northern scholarships at https://nnmc.edu/paying-for-college/scholarships/index.html.