Current Initiatives
In June of 2024, BESE adopted a revised statewide K-12 accountability system, the culmination of a three-year, in-depth process by educators, parents, national experts, and stakeholders to study best practices in accountability and develop a better way to measure school success in Louisiana. The new accountability approach simplifies the scoring formula, emphasizes core skills development, aligns with the state’s refined definition of college and career readiness, and rewards schools for gains in student academic growth as well as performance.
Louisiana is continuing the state’s tradition of periodic professional reviews of the state’s academic content standards for students. This process will ensure that Louisiana maintains strong expectations for teaching and learning and that standards continue to prepare students to successfully transition to postsecondary education and the workplace.
Passed by Congress in 2015, ESSA is a federal law that requires states to have a plan for spending federal funds, for measuring the skills students learn, and for supporting students in making academic progress. ESSA, which replaces the No Child Left
Behind Act (NCLB), is largely focused on the needs of historically disadvantaged students, including students from low-income homes, students whose home language is not English, and students with disabilities. The law is not a federal plan; it is
a federal law requiring states to develop their own plans. Louisiana's final plan will be submitted to the U.S. Department of Education in 2017 with the anticipation that it will be approved prior to the start of the 2017-2018 school year.
The Minimum Foundation Program (MFP) is the fiscal key to Louisiana’s goals of providing each Louisiana citizen with the minimum educational foundation for success.
Act 1, also known as the Talent Statute, allows districts and schools to make personnel policies and personnel decisions based on teacher effectiveness and performance.
Also referred to as the Choice Law, Act 2 increases parents’ and students’ ability to make choices in the educational process.
Louisiana’s students must have a strong foundation to ensure their success at all levels of education. Act 3, known as the Early Childhood Education Act, seeks to establish this foundation during early childhood.