BATON ROUGE — Gov. Bobby Jindal says he’s not surprised that his extensive agenda for revising education in Louisiana already is drawing opposition from those who would be affected by the proposed changes.
Jindal laid out for members of the Louisiana Association of Business and Industry a series of “reforms” that he will present for the Legislature to consider in a session that begins March 12.
The governor’s plan touches on issues that in past years have been sensitive and legislators have been reluctant to address. Jindal said now is the time to address those issues.
School boards around the state object to those proposals because every time a student gets a voucher, goes to a charter school or enrolls in a virtual school, that’s less funding for current schools. The formula for public schools is based largely on enrollment.
Jindal said the state is making improvements in education but “it’s clear that we need to move faster and we need to do it now. Our children do not have time to wait. They only grow up once and they have one shot to receive a quality education.
“We can’t wait for another generation of students to graduate from high school unprepared for the workforce and higher education — or to dropout before they even get there,” he said. “This applies not only to K-12 education, but to early childhood education as well.”
For the rest of the article, go to Reform plan hits on sensitive problems
