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The Status of Geography Education in Louisiana: Progress, Promise, and Challenge

This paper chronicles the strides made in PK–12 geography education in Louisiana in the last decade through efforts of the Louisiana Geography Education Alliance (LaGEA) and the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities (LEH). Even though Geography is not a mandatory stand-alone subject for the curriculum and assessment, the state Department of Education recognizes the discipline by embedding it in social studies. The status of geography is presented against the backdrop of socio-economic conditions in Louisiana which stifle delivery of standards-based education in especially impoverished metropolitan statistical areas and delta parishes. Conditions include: rural and urban poverty, high-school dropout rates, meager state expenditure on PK–12 education, and the regional north–south dichotomy within the state. The paper concludes that despite the initiatives of LaGEA and LEH, Geography remains a stepchild in Louisiana public schools. During the last decade a fairly solid geography education foundation has been laid. In the next century it is hoped that Geography would not simply remain on the Department of Education radar screen but that it would take its honored place in curricular and assessment policies. For that to transpire Geography educators at all levels will have to mount a more concerted and vocal public relations campaign.