Sen. Mary Landrieu on the next administration

We're spending the next couple of hours with U.S. Senator Mary Landrieu (D-LA) and other leaders on what to expect on the horizon as it pertains to her top priority, education. She's anticipating a congressional fight on education reform and is hopeful that meaningful change can take place in the next four years. She characterized the current public school system in America as a crisis. It's time, she says, to compare our test scores not with other schools within our states but against the South Koreans and other academic rivals for the next generation.

Paul Vallas (far right in the picture above) is the current superintendent for New Orleans recovery public schools. He was charged with taking over academically failing schools in the wake of Katrina and fixing them. He's a firm believer that schools should be provided with a best practices model with a rigorous curriculum, and those that are historically dysfunctional should be converted to a charter school until they become competitive again.

One reason I have trouble synchronizing with this panel is that much of the political oxygen in Arkansas for the last two decades has been spent on Lake View. It's boring and not blogworthy, but after discussing the funding matrix, Vallas says many of the KIPP programs should be included in the funding/Piccus discussions alongside adequacy, like 8 hour school days, longer school years, etc. Is that practical? I'd like to bring him to a committee setting in Little Rock.