The Louisiana Federation of Teachers has endorsed a set of general principles that a number of public education stakeholders have pledged to honor in the upcoming legislative session.
“For the past six years, education reform has been defined by politicians, corporate profiteers and ideological extremists,” Federation President Steve Monaghan said. “The result has been an avalanche of unconstitutional laws, a raid on public education funds and baseless attacks on teachers in our public schools.
“The leaders of this bogus reform movement have manipulated data and used misleading statistics to justify the destruction of public education in Louisiana,” he said. “We are proud to stand with other public education stakeholders to correct the narrative touted by the current administration and offer real hope for our children’s future.”
In an invitation asking educators to adopt principles of unity, Louisiana School Boards Association Executive Director Scott Richard wrote, “We are experiencing unprecedented times during this era of ‘education reform’ in our state. It is of the utmost importance that we strive to work collaboratively as stakeholders in order to facilitate practical initiatives that truly work to improve student achievement.”
The principles adopted by the signers of the agreement include:
- United advocacy for prioritizing public education funding regarding the state funding formula.
- United advocacy for a more strategic and comprehensive transition to raising standards and adopting accompanying assessments.
- United advocacy for a non-punitive accountability system and a flexible employee evaluation system during the transition to higher standards.
- United advocacy for addressing issues regarding privatization of public education in Louisiana.
- United advocacy regarding meaningful and sincere stakeholder input in all policy matters so that we are all working together to improve student achievement in Louisiana.
From left to right in the photo are National School Board Association President David Pickler, LFT President Steve Monaghan, LAE President Debbie Meaux, Louisiana Association of School Superintendents President Patrice Pujol, Louisiana School Boards Association Immediate Past President John Smith, PTA Representative Sonnie Savoie, LSBA Executive Director Scott Richard and Louisiana Association of School Executives Executive Director Rodgers Pope. Not pictured: Louisiana Association of School Principals Debbie Schum.