When the State Gives Back: Reunifying the Orleans Public School System

• In Event: New Directions in School Choice Research: Mechanisms, Processes, and Interactions

Abstract

The political dynamics that shape an urban school system can have a lasting impact on how educational reforms are designed and implemented. Politics influences who controls and manages the daily operations and oversight that happens within school districts. This includes how processes are centralized (or decentralized), and how governance is structured to guide teaching and learning activities that happen inside classrooms (Lipman, 2015). When Hurricane Katrina disrupted the New Orleans public school system in 2005, the state legislature acted to place the school district under state control in effort to reform public education within the city. The Recovery School District (RSD), operated by the Louisiana Department of Education, was tasked with turning around low-performing schools, restructuring systems, and redefining the educational landscape within New Orleans (Jabbar, 2016). The state takeover of New Orleans public schools created new political dynamics that impacted the eventual transition back to local control that took place in 2018.

The reunification of New Orleans Public Schools, the process of reverting control of the educational system back to the local school board, was a monumental process that involved numerous stakeholders at both the state and local level. As power shifted to the locally elected school board, questions remained about the ability of local leaders to oversee a citywide system that mainly involved newly converted public charter schools. At the same time, issues around equity, academic improvement, and investment in teaching and learning were still critical needs to be addressed.

Through qualitative interviews and analysis of local media sources, our study examined the political dynamics within New Orleans prior to, during, and after the reunification of New Orleans public schools under state control. We captured each of these phases of reunification to highlight the role politics played in supporting opportunities for educational reform, or creating barriers for enacting systems change policies. Our analysis of elite stakeholders’ interviews involved an in-depth coding scheme that categorized data into themes around relationships, governance, use of human resources, and defining success related to reunification. Analysis of local media sources assisted in understanding how the community responded to policy changes being discussed and decided upon during the reunification transitional phase. This included analyzing publicly recorded school board meetings to capture how community members voiced various positions as it related to the reunification process.

Our findings revealed that local leaders expressed optimism about the reunification process, and the potential of educational improvement for students within the New Orleans public school system. At the same time, leaders also voiced concern about the impact of reunification on schools’ academic progress, and its effect on minoritized student populations as equity-focused initiatives were either non-existent or not fully to fruition yet. Our paper provides evidence for ways to think about state takeovers and when those takeovers transfer power back to local communities.

Authors

• Joshua Childs, University of Texas at Austin
  Presenting Author

• Douglas N. Harris, Tulane University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Hanora Tracy, Tulane University
  Presenting Author

• Kait Ogden, University of Texas at Austin
  Presenting Author