No Idea Too Radical: Inside New Orleans’ Dramatic K-12 Turnaround After Katrina
School had been in session for 10 days when Hurricane Katrina made its way up the Gulf Coast and slammed into New Orleans. On Monday, Aug. 29, 2005, the resulting storm surge breached major levees, leaving the city underwater. Only a handful of schools were unharmed.
As they contemplated the road to reconstruction, New Orleans’ leaders knew residents could not come back without schools for their kids. But the district — at the time the nation’s 50th largest, with 60,000 students — was at an inflection point. Official corruption was so rampant the FBI had set up an office at district HQ.
A revolving door of leaders — the Washington Post dubbed it a “murderer’s row for superintendents” — had failed to make a dent in some of the nation’s poorest academic outcomes. Louisiana’s legislative auditor called it a “train wreck,” noting that no one knew how much money the district had.
As to what should come next, no idea was too radical, the interim superintendent at the time, Ora Watson, told PBS.
Read more at The 74.
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Imali Ariyarathne, seventh-grade teacher at Langston Hughes Academy, introduces her students to the captivating world of science.
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