Article written by Adeline Fields
As East Baton Rouge Parish schools prepare to begin a new academic year, Superintendent LaMont Cole marked his one-year anniversary by addressing the Baton Rouge Press Club Monday afternoon—outlining some of the key decisions made over the last twelve months and reinforcing his vision for the future of the school district.
Cole, who took office in July 2024, acknowledged the weight of decisions made during his first year, including the closure of nine schools across the district. Framing it as a matter of necessity, Cole said the closures were rooted in a commitment to student success and more efficient use of resources.
“With the development of the plan to close schools here in our community, we wanted to make sure we were putting students first to ensure they were receiving the type of support they need in order to be successful. As we visited schools and learned that many, many, many of our facilities were in horrible conditions, were in poor shape; students didn’t have the resources and the adequate tools they needed in order to be successful; some of them were in classrooms where we did not have certified teachers, where we did not have college degree individuals standing before them every day because we had a severe teacher shortage. Not only here in the city of Baton Rouge, but all across the country, post-COVID, we had severe teacher shortages.
And so, what we wanted to do was make sure we were using our resources more efficiently, we were putting our students in better seats and better facilities with better academic programming in the hopes that they would have teachers before them who were certified and had experience to do the work. And so we had to realign some things, make the tough decisions to close some buildings, and then make sure that we were providing the right type of support for our students.”
That student-first approach, Cole said, also guided the district’s expansion of early childhood education through new foundational learning centers. These programs are particularly vital for families who otherwise can’t afford private daycare or pre-K programs.
“We recognized that, as times are changing, we had to shift to put some emphasis on the early childhood experience, and so with that we’ve opened two foundational learning centers at Merrydale Elementary and Melrose Elementary for Pre-K 4 to 2nd grade. We understand children oftentimes in this community don’t have access to early childhood education. We understand that our access to an early childhood education is vital for student success.
We also understand daycare is extremely expensive. For a single family who has to pay 700 dollars a week for daycare, that could be extremely taxing—which could lead to very young people not having access to early childhood education and being at home until they reach the age of five. And when they arrive at school at the age of five, they are already two to three years behind. And so we have to think about and we did think about: ‘What can we do as a school system to expand the early childhood experience?’ So we did that in our Pre-K 3 and Pre-K 4 centers.”
Cole also emphasized the importance of listening to community concerns—especially around absenteeism and student safety. He said those conversations, along with truancy data, helped drive the district’s decision to implement later start times at six schools this fall.
“As part of the journey, listening to families, hearing the cry from the community, and then using the data to drive our decisions, we realized we have higher rates of absenteeism in our state. More importantly, in the city of Baton Rouge. We have higher rates of truancy in the city of Baton Rouge. What we looked at is how early we start school. In the city of Baton Rouge, it is common to ride through any of our neighborhoods, but some of the more challenging environments we know where crime is high, you see students standing on corners at five o’clock in the morning before the sun comes up. That is unconscionable, in my opinion, that we have young people, 10-11 year old young ladies, standing on the corner in challenging areas at five in the morning, waiting for their buses.
This is a system that has been established over a long period of time, and, for me, it’s about time we do something a little bit different. And so, I was always told if you do the same thing over and over and expect a different result, that is the very definition of insanity. And so, if we want to see something different, we have to do something different; so to that end, we adjust the start times at some of the schools. At six of our schools, to be exact: two high schools, two middle [schools], and two elementary schools. We changed and adjusted the start times. All of the research, all of the experts, all of the healthcare experts have said to us: when adolescent children in particular start school later, they do better.”
The two high schools that are pushing back start times will now begin their day at 8:50 AM—a research-backed decision that Cole says is long overdue.
“We have some of the earliest start times in the state and in the country. Our students currently were starting school at 7:10 AM. They get off the bus at 6:50, have breakfast, and are in class by 7:10—which means that a student who has ridden two hours on the bus had to be up before 5:00 AM just to be in class on time. And for adolescent/teenage students, that is far too early in the morning for them to be in school. What the research tells us, the biological clock of a teenager… they don’t even start winding down, based on all of the access they have to social media, streaming services, television, and smartphone devices, until around 11:00 at night. Which means they probably are not falling asleep until after midnight, and they have to be right back up before 5:00 AM to be in class. And we’re expecting them to be prepared, to be alert, to not be cranky, and to not be lethargic in terms of their efforts. But we ourselves as adults have not always made the appropriate decisions to put them in the right position, so we changed the school start time at two of our high schools where we were seeing the highest rates of absenteeism, the highest rates of truancy, we change the start time from 7:10 to 8:50.”
Students impacted by the new start times will no longer need to travel as far to transfer points to catch their bus—an adjustment Cole says will make bus routes safer and more efficient. He added that the district eventually hopes to push all high school start times to 8:30 or later, and that several other schools have already expressed interest in that change.
Looking ahead, Cole described the upcoming year as a time for refinement:
“Now as we look ahead to the 25-26 school year, 24-25 was realignment and 25-26 is going to be refinement. How do we refine what we have? Oftentimes new superintendents enter into communities, and try to be innovative and try to do something new without really assessing what exists, and what works, and what isn’t working. And so we want to refine what we know works, and then add to what perhaps isn’t working or do away with it altogether.
What we have realized in our school system is that the success is in the support. So how do we move about our district and provide support to every single individual who is working to help our students? And more in particular, how do we provide support for teachers and staff who are working with our students directly every single day?”
Cole also highlighted transportation upgrades, including new technology on district buses to make rides to and from school safer and provide support to bus drivers.
“We have nearly 500 buses that are routed, fully air conditioned, so we’re really excited about our students being on buses that we know are air conditioned. We’ve added cameras to all of our buses to ensure that we know what is happening on buses in the event we get reports that some mischievous behavior has taken place. We can look and see who was right and who’s more right. So we’re excited about having that video backup, live remote access so if we observe something that’s happening, we can remote in and have a conversation and say to the bus driver and the kids on the bus—I may be on there on the loudspeaker on the bus—saying ‘sit down, we’re watching.’ So we have a GPS tracking system, motion system activation, and those drop off hubs. So we are increasing and expanding our transportation systems to provide support.”
For those wanting more information about the realignment plans or upcoming changes, Cole said the district has launched a new online dashboard detailing everything you need to know.
“If you, in this community, are interested in everything we’re doing around the realignment plan, we created a dashboard, working with our chief of facilities, our chief of technology, as well as our consultant, who helped guide us through this project, to set up a dashboard. And if you go to our website, you can see, step-by-step, everything we decided, everything we’ve been working on, and all of our preparations for the start of the school year. Step-by-step updates… it is a phenomenal resource that we’ve developed to keep the community informed and to be transparent about our efforts.”
The Superintendent says he hopes East Baton Rouge’s efforts around realignment, early education, later start times, and transportation will serve as a model for other school districts across the country.