Another session of the Louisiana Legislature is set to convene next week with the usual raft of bills to make over the management of higher education. Proposed legislation would strengthen the Board of Regents, let schools raise tuition without legislative approval, cap state-funded scholarships and merge two north Louisiana universities. Prospects are very strong that none of them will pass. After last term’s futile quest for a single governing board and last year’s racially divisive attempt to merge two New Orleans universities, this Legislature and Gov. Bobby Jindal seem ready to go on spring break from rethinking higher education. There is too much else to do. The session agenda already is crowded with more controversial issues than in the last four years combined. Besides the perennial budget challenges, there will be pitched battles over teacher tenure, school vouchers, retirement system overhaul and oilfield pollution lawsuits. With all that in the hopper, “Where’s the time for higher education?” asks Rep. Steve Carter, R-Baton Rouge, who chairs the House Education Committee, where bills dealing with colleges will go to die. Read the full column here.
(John Maginnis publishes LaPolitics Weekly, a newsletter on Louisiana politics, at LaPolitics.com.)
