In football’s Southeastern Conference, you don’t sit on a winning game plan and refuse to run it. When you’ve got the playbook, the recruits and the crowd behind you, you take the field.
That’s exactly where Louisiana found itself last year. After four years and 12 separate bills, the Legislature passed in 2024 the LA GATOR Scholarship Program — Louisiana’s first education scholarship account program — and Gov. Jeff Landry signed it into law. For tens of thousands of families, it was a long-overdue breakthrough.
LA GATOR funds appropriated to the program can be used by families to pay for private school tuition, stand-alone courses, textbooks and curricula, tutoring, supplies and other approved educational expenses. These dollars “follow” children to the school or learning environment that their families — those who know them best — believe is the best fit for their individual needs and values.
Unfortunately, when presented with the opportunity to make this a reality, the Senate Finance Committee punted.
When the 2025 budget season arrived, Landry requested $93.5 million for LA GATOR, and the House backed it. But the Senate Finance Committee cut $50 million, leaving just enough to continue covering roughly 6,000 students already receiving state-funded scholarships — and only a tiny fraction of the new students who had applied.
Nearly 40,000 Louisiana families applied for LA GATOR last year, with roughly 35,000 meeting eligibility requirements. Most were low-income families seeking better options for their children. Yet all but about 700 were left waiting. This spring, the state received more than 17,000 eligible applications.
On May 7, some of those families came to Baton Rouge.
Parents drove in from across the state. Students sat before lawmakers and shared what education choice has meant to them. For hours, senators heard something no spreadsheet can measure: Education is not one-size-fits-all, and tax dollars should follow the child — not the system.
Meanwhile, Louisiana’s SEC neighbors aren’t waiting.
Arkansas passed the LEARNS Act in 2023 and now offers universal education freedom accounts. Florida now serves more than half a million students through scholarship programs. Alabama passed the CHOOSE Act and is expanding funding and eligibility. Tennessee joined them in 2025. Georgia just increased in size and scope its Georgia Promise scholarship program.
These aren’t abstract policy wins. These are families in Little Rock, Mobile, Nashville and Miami who can choose the school that fits their child — not just the one assigned by their ZIP code.
Louisiana families want and deserve the same opportunity.
Senate President Cameron Henry says caution is warranted, citing concerns about long-term costs. Fiscal responsibility matters. But Louisiana is already competing against states investing boldly in education choice. Texas lawmakers approved a $1 billion appropriation for school choice. Florida’s programs cost even more — and Florida continues to win the competition for jobs, population and opportunity.
And Alabama, about the same size as Louisiana, will be spending $200 million on its scholarship program, without even coming close to busting the state’s budget.
Families vote with their feet. Increasingly, they’re choosing states that trust parents.
Last year’s funding of just over 700 students out of over 35,000 wasn’t a demand problem. It was a political will problem.
The LA GATOR law is already on the books. Gov. Landry is ready. The House is ready. Education leaders are ready. Families are ready — and they proved it by showing up.
The only question now is whether the Senate Finance Committee will let it work — or whether Louisiana will keep watching the rest of its conference pull ahead while Baton Rouge debates whether to run the play.
When Alabama is beating you on the field and in the classroom, it’s time to ask hard questions in Baton Rouge.
Lane Kiffin didn’t come here to punt. Neither should the Senate Finance Committee.