Examining top reasons why Louisiana's education system is

failing - New Orleans Political Buzz

The National Center for Education Statistics ranked Louisiana as the second-worst state in the
country for public education. Louisiana has consistently performed lower than the national average
for years. A separate academic index by the American Institute of Physics ranked Louisiana 48 out of
50 in science education, and 47 out of 50 in mathematics. The Louisiana Department of Education
reported that only 67 of Louisiana students graduated in 2010, giving Louisiana the third highest
failure rate in the nation.
There are some things Louisiana has done for decades that prevent it from reaching the national
average - and there are some things Louisiana is doing that some say will degrade our students
education even more for years to come. This article lists the top most damaging problems of the
Louisiana educational system.
Overspending on the TOPS Scholarship program while also raising college tuition
Louisiana spends too much on the TOPS Scholarship program, which pays the majority of college
students' tuition, according to the a report by the Louisiana Budget Project.
The report by Policy Analyst Tim Mathis states that the cost of maintaining the TOPS Scholarship
continues to increase with the rising tuition and fees. The average TOPS award is projected to rise to
$4,315 within the next year, costing Louisiana $177 million, an additional $22 million from last year.
In all, Louisiana spends 81 percent of its financial aid on TOPS and similar merit-based programs,
which is significantly higher than the regional and national averages.
"Today, 72 percent of all TOPS recipients come from families that make $50,000 or more per year,
well over the median income for Louisiana," according to Mathis. "Fully 39 percent come from
families that make $100,000 or more per year. This is a questionable allocation of scarce state
resources in a state in which 56 percent of households make less than $50,000 while only 16 percent
make more than $100,000."
According to the report, there is a very strong correlation between a student's family wealth and
their GPA. Since the income cap for how do you start a business the TOPS Scholarship was removed,
the percentage of recipients from higher-income families has skyrocketed, and - conversely - the
percentage of those from lower income families has fallen.
The report states the TOPS program also doesn't "encourage academic excellence" as it was
originally meant to do, instead providing scholarships to average- and below-average performing
students who come from families that do not need financial assistance. There is also evidence that
approximately 77 percent of students who lose their TOPS scholarship each year re-enroll in college
and still graduate at a higher rate than non-TOPS students.
Most TOPS awards require a minimum of a 2.5 GPA, which is much lower than other southern merit-
based scholarship requirements. Both Tennessee and Georgia require a 3.0, both states having a
higher ranking in education than Louisiana.
The report concludes that the state wants to encourage academic excellence, it should increase the
standards to at least a 3.0, while reallocating the saved tax money to need-based grants, such as the
Louisiana Go Grant, to make up for those who are in lower-income demographic. This leads us to our
next problem...
Not spending enough on Go Grants and other need-based grants and scholarships
While Louisiana spends too much on the TOPS Scholarship, it consistently underfunds need-based
programs, such as the Louisiana Go low cost business ideas Grant, according to the same Louisiana
Budget Project report, which shows that Louisiana spends only 17 percent of state-provided student
financial assistance on need-based grants, less one-half the average amount other southern states
spend, and less than one-third of the national average.
Compared to other southern states and to states nationally, Louisiana spends a disproportionately
large share of its financial aid resources on those who can readily afford college while providing too
little to those who need financial help in order to have a chance at a college education.
Louisiana's college costs have risen from 6 percent of the median household income to about 10
percent. But that's just the median income, not the lower-income students. According to LOSFA, the
Louisiana Office of Student Financial Assistance, low-income households require 107 percent of
their annual income to pay just to attend one year at a local public four-year university.
The initial purpose Go Grants program, according to the report, was to bridge the gap between
federal Pell Grants and lower-income students' cost to attend college. More than a year ago,
according to LOSFA records, a full-time student who qualifies for a maximum Pell Grant has an
unmet financial need of $6,168, on average. With a fully low cost business ideas funded Go Grant of
$2,000, that student would still need $4,168 to attend college.
LOSFA states that fully-funding the Go Grant program would cost $55 million - but this could be
easily accomplished with money saved from increasing the TOPS GPA requirement to a 3.0. In
addition, Go Grants could be partially financed through the Millennium Trust Fund, a fund that
protects of the TOPS program that originated from a class-action lawsuits of states against tobacco
companies decades earlier.
The "Louisiana Science Education Act": a stealth creationist bill
Added to the Louisiana law-books in 2008, the Louisiana Science Education Act allows a loop-hole
teachers to use supplemental materials to teach religious theories (creationism and intelligent
design) in science classrooms. The religious theories could be taught alongside evolution, even
though the religious theories have no grounding in science and evolution is one of the key tenets of
modern biology and life sciences.
The Louisiana Science Education Act adopts the concept of "academic freedom," the idea teachers
should have the freedom to choose to teach different theories equally. However, this "freedom"
ignores the mass scientific consensus on the validity of evolution.
While the Louisiana Science Education Act does not directly force teachers to teach these anti-
science theories, it leaves enough wiggle-room for the possibility. In fact, according to the July 24
edition of the Baton Rouge Advocate two years ago, a member of the Livingston Parish School Board
tried to use the loop-hole to push creationism in the classroom.
Livingston Parish school board member David Tate told the Advocate "We let them teach evolution
to our children, but I think all of us sitting up here on this School Board believe in Creationism. Why
can't we get someone with religious beliefs to teach Creationism?"
Fellow board member Clint Mitchell agreed: "Teachers should have the freedom to look at
creationism and find a way to get it into the classroom."
More parish school boards could also follow suit, especially with the new loop hole in the law books
brought about the Louisiana Science Education Act.
Two years later the act was instituted as law, a repeal effort was pushed by several scientific,
educational, and even religious organizations. The repeal was endorsed by The American Association
for the Advancement of Science, the largest general science organization in the world with over 10
million members. The repeal has also been supported by 78 Nobel prize winners
One New Orleans Democratic representative, Walt Leger, who was also a part of the effort, said it
best as to why the law needed to be repealed.
"The most fundamental part of our biology education - evolution - has been undermined," Leger said.
"Research institutions know this. Major science organizations know this. Colleges know this.
Companies know this ... They'll question our scientific education because they won't know if we've
been taught creationism. They won't know if these laws intimidated our teachers into not teaching
evolution. They'll doubt our qualifications. And then, they won't accept us into college or give us that
job doing cutting-edge science."
More than decreasing the standard of education, it also costs the state jobs and money. Louisiana
has already lost somewhere in the ballpark of $1 million from the law, which was the direct reason
the Society of Intergrative and Comparative Biology cited when it pulled its annual convention from
Louisiana, which would have brought nearly 2,000 scientists and graduate students to New Orleans
for at least five days.
Unfortunately, to this day, the act remains in the law books.
Spending money attempting to fix the school systems rather than rewarding good teachers
A traditional mantra about education by liberals is that we spend too much on other things and not
enough on education. While this is partly true, where the government chooses to put education's cut
of taxpayer money can have either a large benefit or a damaging effect on quality of education.
Various studies show that spending more on education doesn't necessarily improve scores. Even
though the United States is the clear leader in total annual education spending and spending per-
capita, it ranks 9 out of 12 in science against the top leading countries, and 10 out of 12 in math.
After adjusting for inflation, the per-student cost of education spending has nearly tripled in the last
four decades, while student achievement has plateaued.
The trend occurs on the state level, as well. Even the Center for American Progress, an arguably
liberal policy research and advocacy organization, shows that in Louisiana the schools spending the
most per-student are also the schools with the worst scores.
The Center for American Progress put out a report stating that, on average, the most inefficient
districts in the country devote an additional 3 percent of their budgets to administration, operations,
and other similar expenditures, rather than to exceptionally-performing teachers.
The report cited a study from the Brookings Institution, an non-partisan organization that has been
described as everything from liberal to centrist to conservative by various newspapers and
magazines, showing evidence that students who have 3-4 highly effective teachers in a row will
exceed academically, while those with a sequence of non-effective teachers will fall further behind.
Another study by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology found that raising teacher wages by 10
percent could reduce high school dropout rates by more than 3 percent. And Louisiana definitely has
a drop-out problem.
Louisiana is the 6th worst state in the nation for public school teacher salaries, according to the
National Education Association. While this might not necessarily mean that Louisiana isn't properly
rewarding the best teachers, it does imply that more of the money being spent on education is going
to non-instructional costs.
It's not only liberal and centrist organizations coming to the conclusion we need to better reward
better teachers - even Gov. Bobby Jindal said the exact same thing in the past.
"If you have teachers who are doing better we should look at ways to recognize that achievement,
compensate that achievement," Jindal told the Baton Rouge Advocate. "It could be through
recognition, financial recognition, compensation ... It could also be through our promotion and
retention policy."
"As we speak today we waste billions of dollars on failing schools and classrooms where children
aren't getting a great education," Jindal continued. "So obviously we have to prioritize how we spend
those dollars."
Despite needing to spend money to reward effective teachers, money spent on non-instructive
education costs have not been a complete waste. Additional funds appear to have helped narrow the
achievement gap between minority and white students. Between 1973 to 2008 the math scale scores
of African-American 4th graders jumped by more than 30 points - roughly three grade levels.
Creationist voucher system will further degrade science scores
In addition to the Louisiana Science Education Act, which undermines the scientific teaching of
evolution in public schools, a voucher program will be using taxpayer money to send children to
private schools that teach creationism and bash evolution, using textbooks defining evolution as an
"unproven hypothesis", even though the vast majority of scientists support it.
According to a report by the Associated Press, more than 750 voucher students will receive taxpayer
money to send them to 19 religious schools that teach from textbook publishers that teach
creationism instead of evolution. The total in taxpayer money for this voucher program is over $4
million, which will be taken from public schools and their teachers.
A separate report by Reuters states under the new voucher rules, schools with fewer than 40
voucher students enrolled can continue to receive state funds even if their students fail to
demonstrate basic competency in science (as well as reading, math, and social studies). Ten of the
19 private schools in the AP report have fewer than 40 voucher slots.
According to an article by AlterNet, within a year the voucher program was planned to expand
dramatically, from about 5,100 students to 380,000. If all 380,000 students get vouchers during
2013, it could equal $3.3 billion taken from public education and put towards private vouchers, with
many of the vouchers going to private schools teaching creationism or intelligent design instead of
evolution.
While private and charter schools have a lot of potential for raising education scores in Louisiana,
there needs to be more oversight of them, to the point where taxpayer dollars aren't spent on anti-
science theories.
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