Where Do Louisiana’s School Rank Nationally?

With DeSoto Parish schools back in session tomorrow and Bossier, Webster and Caddo, soon to follow, we wondered, how do our schools in Louisiana stack up against the rest of the country?

It turns out, not so well. In fact, according to WalletHub, Louisiana schools are the worst in the country. When it comes to the average ACT score, Louisiana ranks 47th and we're 45th when it comes to drop out rates. With our issues in Louisiana with regard to our budget crisis and funding TOPS, this is bad news!

Louisiana ranks 48th with both reading and math test scores and our teacher to student ratio doesn't help. Clearly, our students need special attention but we sit in 30th place when it comes to that.

Let's face it, it's hard to find good teachers when the pay isn't that great and most feel like they're teaching students to pass a test, not to learn. You can see that plainly in Louisiana, because we rank 37th when it comes to licensed/certified public K-12 teachers.

Without giving away my age, I can tell you that the reputation of Louisiana's schools personally affected me in high school. My family moved to Ohio my junior year of high school and they wouldn't recognize my AP classes... that would have been good for college credit had I stayed in Louisiana. The interesting part about that was is that their classes were no more difficult, enlightening or in depth... Go figure!