LFT President Steve Monaghan explains why Gov. Jindal's so-called Red Tape Reduction and Local Waiver Empowerment Program is the most dangerous bill in the legislature this year.
June 1, 2010: This week, the Senate Education Committee may hear one of the most dangerous education bills ever proposed in Louisiana, the so-called Red Tape Reduction and Local Empowerment Waiver Program.
If this bill passes, local school systems could ask the state board of education to waive virtually all of the laws and policies that govern public schools.
That includes class size, teacher tenure, student discipline, sick leave, curriculum requirements and even the salary schedules.
Like earlier top-down reform measures, it ignores and disrespects the expertise of teachers and staff. In its seven plus pages, this bill does not give teachers or support staff so much as an honorable mention.
Passage of this bill could mean vastly different learning conditions from school to school and from district to district.
At the same time, Governor Jindal has signed a new law that standardizes teacher evaluations and makes student achievement a part of evaluation across the state.
This just doesn’t make sense. Taken together, these bills would create a public policy train wreck. Teachers would all be held to account under a single standard, but under wildly varied conditions.
Finally, senators and representatives should not hand over their legal obligations to policy boards like the state board of education. Allowing school boards to selectively ignore laws unwisely surrenders legislative authority to individuals who were not elected to be lawmakers.
That's why defeating HB 1368 is now the most important goal of this legislative session.
To learn more, please click on the links below.
To send a message asking the Senate Education Committee to oppose HB 1368, please click here.
To download a flier explaing why HB 1368 is the most dangerous bill of the session, please click here.
To read the LFT floor letter explaining the Federation's opposition to HB 1368, please click here.
To read the complete bill, please click here.