Thanks to the reporting of Mercedes Schneider, we have followed the travails of that state over several years of “reform” leadership: Republican Governor Jindal pushed charters and vouchers. Out-of-State money elected a pro-Jindal Board. That board selected John White as state superintendent. White was TFA and Broadies. He had worked for Joel Klein, then briefly ran the New Orleans Recovery School District. As Jindal’s chief school officer, he enthusiastically promoted charters and vouchers and made outlandish promises about what he would achieve. When Democrat John Bel Edwards was elected, he wanted to dump White, but didn’t have the votes on the board. White resigned earlier this year. The state board appointed Cade Brumley, a veteran Louisiana educator (surprise!).
As Schneider describes here, White’s team of inexperienced but well paid assistants, mostly TFA alums, headed for the exits.
She writes:
Brumley’s leadership hires tend to have both classroom and administrative experience related to a traditional ed career path; they tend to have roots in Louisiana, and they include women and people of color.
Furthermore, even though some of his admin hires represent ed reform, Brumley favors individuals with grounding in traditional teacher/admin training. And, keep in mind that all who accept a position in Brumley’s LDOE must be willing to work under a state superintendent to whom John White’s TFA-heavy, ed-reform leadership is submitting their resignations.
I find all of this very encouraging, indeed.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
The COO of New America, the think tank of Eric Schmidt (Google), may be unhappy to hear Mercedes’ news. The CEO’s bio described her part in the privatization efforts in Louisiana. Hmmmm, the same COO co-authored an SSIR article focused on the plight of people of color trying to advance in corporations.
Speaking of Broadies- Gen. Anthony Tata, a Broadie himself, has been appointed by Trump to head the DOD’s policy shop. Tata’s offensive tweets (since deleted) about the Obamas may derail the nomination. But, fortunate for him, his extracurricular activities didn’t impact his military career. Military.com tells the story,
General Tata, a Broadie, worked for Michelle Rhee, then was hired by a Tea Party school board in Wake County, NC, to eliminate its successful desegregation plan. Gerald Grant wrote a book about that plan, which integrated every school. It is called “Hope and Despair in the American City: Why There Are No Bad Schools in Wake County.” Tata wiped out the successful plan. In the next school board election, the board changed hands and Tata was ousted.
Thanks for the history.
I forgot to mention that during John White’s eight years as Louisiana superintendent, none of his promises about dramatic test score gains came true. Louisiana remains one of the lowest performing states on NAEP. AndcNew Orleans is below the state average.
so much hat, so little cattle: the exact reality of what has happened with our district’s endless years of “accountability” invasions
Somewhat related, saw this in my LinkedIn email feed this morning, posted by deformer Bob Wise: “Now, more than ever, educators are contending with global challenges affecting the world’s students. This Thursday, June 18 at 10am EDT, the Global Science of Learning and Education Network (GSoLEN), UNESCO, and International Mind, Brain, and Education Society (IMBES) are hosting a video conference on supporting teachers through global challenges with the #scienceoflearning. For access to the conference, please comment your interest on this post or send a direct message for the Zoom link.”
I don’t know what IMBES is, but what the acronym stands for is pretty pretentiously hilarious.