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Key Findings

1. Louisiana education reforms have spanned four key areas of the education spectrum: early childhood education, K–12 academics, teacher preparation, and graduation pathways.
2. To pursue these reforms, Louisiana has relied on a range of policy levers, from more conventional ones such as mandates and incentives, to less conventional ones focused on resource alignment and communication across all layers of the education system.
3. In each area of Louisiana's reform efforts, there is a clarity of vision around what constitutes "high-quality" teaching and learning.
4. State leaders particularly use communication as a policy lever to gather feedback and promote buy-in among leaders and teachers.
5. The Louisiana Department of Education strategically partners with external stakeholders to promote and disseminate the state's vision.
6. Louisiana's accountability system utilizes indicators of both instructional processes and student outcomes, with an increasing emphasis on outcomes as students get older.

In response to the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act of 2001 and the Race to the Top (RTTT) program that began in 2009 — and more recently the Every Student Succeeds Act of 2015 — states across the nation have taken a variety of legislative and policy steps to make their schools and teachers more accountable for student learning. One state garnering attention for its recent efforts to improve education quality and outcomes is Louisiana. Some of the reforms put in place in Louisiana are extensive in scope — for example, restructuring the system of authority of early childhood providers, and offering external industry certifications as part of high school diplomas. Other reforms are more structurally modest and are connected with changes in teachers' work in schools, such as mathematics curriculum reforms.