For things to change, says Business Report Publisher Rolfe McCollister, things must change.
“That was and is the case for education in Louisiana and America,” McCollister writes in his latest column. “And after decades of just blaming failure in our government-run schools on ‘money,’ many parents, politicians and voters have decided to embrace change.”
Change in education has come in the form of choice, competition and innovation, says McCollister, adding “the same combination that has made America’s free enterprise system the strongest on earth.”
Despite the fact that for decades Louisiana was at the bottom and had nowhere to go but up, McCollister says, many refused to change and children suffered.
“Louisiana now has 134 charter schools serving more than 70,000 students. There are 7,400 students using scholarships to attend the school of their choice. But the journey has been rough with many opponents,” McCollister says. “I have shared before one example when Rep. Pat Smith was on the East Baton Rouge Parish School Board and led the charge to keep the successful KIPP Academy from coming to Baton Rouge to help poor black children succeed. How many children lost their chance at a future due to Smith’s actions? There are now 162 KIPP schools in 20 states, including 10 in New Orleans. But there are none in Baton Rouge, since KIPP tried about 14 years ago but was rebuffed here.”
McCollister says that although Rep. Smith is often a harsh critic of Gov. Bobby Jindal, it is Jindal “who has done more to offer school choice to her constituents trapped in failing schools than any governor in Louisiana history.”
Read the full column, in which McCollister also gives his take on new East Baton Rouge Parish Schools Superintendent Warren Drake; Louisiana Democratic Party Chair Sen. Karen Carter Peterson’s recent walk-out on Jindal’s opening speech to the Legislature; and the Capital Area Transit System’s move to raise CEO Bob Mirabito’s salary to $175,000 per year.
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