Voters across Louisiana will decide this month whether to let the new City of St. George form its own school district.
To do that, they have to amend the state’s constitution, which requires a statewide vote. On top of that, voters in the parish must also approve the change.
St. George, a suburb of Baton Rouge, has been trying to break away from the parish’s public school system for more than a decade. WRKF Report for America corps member Alex Cox explains why the split is controversial.
ALEX COX, BYLINE: On a recent weeknight, about 20 people gathered at a high school alumni center in Baton Rouge to phonebank. They urged voters to reject a constitutional amendment on the May ballot that would create a new school system in St. George, separate from the parish. One of the main things driving volunteers — like Shaunn Wyche — to make these calls is their love for East Baton Rouge Parish public schools.
SHAUNN WYCHE: The teachers are committed to the students. Could they use more resources? Yes. Uh, could they send an email more often? Yes. But they teach our children.
COX: Wyche lives in St. George and is a proud dad of a Woodlawn High School graduate.
WYCHE: EBR school systems prepared him for an Ivy League education.
COX: He’s a volunteer at PULSE 225, a PAC that opposes the creation of a separate school system in St. George. Organizers for the split went as far as getting the suburb designated as its own municipality in 2019 to build political support. In a parish-wide vote, it passed with 54% in favor. Wyche says people who are newer to the area have been left out of the conversation.
WYCHE: When you started asking questions about St. George, there was a lot of hostility and a lot of, uh, for lack of a better word, bullying.
COX: Kaitlyn Joshua is another volunteer with PULSE. She lives in St. George with her two kids, one of whom attends EBR schools. The other isn’t old enough yet. She can’t ignore what she describes as the movement’s implicit racism.
KAITLYN JOSHUA: I was at Woodlawn High School 15 years ago when my teachers spent the weekends picketing the lines getting petitions because they didn't want us at the schools.
Wyche and Joshua are both Black. For them, race has always been a big part of the debate since St. George is whiter and wealthier than the parish as a whole.
WYCHE: If it’s not racist, it’s part of racism.
JOSHUA: And if you notice St. George, they, they constantly fight back on this, in this narrative or this rhetoric, because they know it would be detrimental to their campaign.
COX: Every public official in St. George is white. EBR schools are majority Black, including those in St. George. Dustin Yates, St. George’s mayor, disagrees with White and Joshua’s framing. He cites the potential district’s demographics, saying it will be majority-minority to back his claim.
DUSTIN YATES: We’re not leaving anybody behind. We’re just simply asking to control our own destiny and educate the folks that we have here.
COX: Yates believes smaller school districts better serve kids. He says EBR schools is just too big for district leaders to pay enough attention to individual schools. EBR has more than 80, and about a half-dozen are in St. George. Yates gives an example of a football game in Central, a nearby district that broke away from EBR schools in 2007.
YATES: It’s their community high school. Their school board members are there, the superintendent is there, the principal is there, everybody who is involved with that system are attending those games.
COX: He says a smaller scale also makes it easier to engage parents.
YATES: The community is gonna be at the table every step of the way on how this system is developed, built and delivered to the, to the residents.
COX: Yates believes in the power of smaller districts so much that he argues the split will be good for EBR schools as well.
YATES: Now they have less things to maintain. They have less children to educate. Which allows them to focus on the rest of the system.
COX: But a split would hurt EBR schools, at least upfront. The district estimates it would lose about a quarter of its tax revenue. There would be some cost savings, but there would still be about a $70 million gap. EBR school board member Carla Powell-Lewis says it could hamper the district's growth.
CARLA POWELL-LEWIS: That's the part that concerns me the most is, you know, will we lose trajectory, will we lose momentum because we're having to cut so much of our funding to be able to meet the need of this particular school district that is, that is attempting to, to separate from us?
COX: As for the potential St. George district, Yates is extremely confident about its finances. In fact, he’s made a big promise: the city will lower taxes. He says one of the major ways the potential district plans to save is by contracting out positions, like janitors or office staff.
YATES: When you cut down on overhead and on bureaucracy costs. We can put more money in classrooms. We can pay teachers more.
COX: It's taking a page from the city. Most of its day-to-day operations are handled by a private company. While Kaitlyn Joshua hopes voters won’t allow St. George to form its own school system, if they do, she says she’ll be engaged every step of the way.
JOSHUA: I would immediately move to advocating on behalf, and demanding a seat at the table, especially for our Black and brown students that are gonna be stuck left in that school system.
COX: A majority of voters in East Baton Rouge Parish and statewide must approve Amendment 2 on the May ballot to create a new school district in St. George. Election day is May 16.
In Baton Rouge, I’m Alex Cox.
