Licensure Reciprocity: Louisiana

Analysis of Louisiana's policies

Teachers with valid out-of-state certificates are eligible for Louisiana's Professional Level 1 certificate. The state does not require evidence of effective teaching during previous employment in its reciprocity policy. However, to get service credit for three or more years taught in another state, out-of-state teachers must receive a "successful evaluation as provided by board policy."

Louisiana grants waivers for its licensing tests to out-of-state teachers who have three years of experience and teach for one year in a Louisiana public or private school under the Out-of-State certificate, a three-year nonrenewable certificate issued to teachers who have not met the state's testing requirements.

Applicants are required to have completed a teacher preparation program and meet the state's recency requirement of five years of experience immediately preceding application. Candidates who have not taught for five years may be issued a one-year certificate to complete six semester hours. 

In addition, Louisiana requires out-of-state teachers to have completed student teaching, an internship or have three years of teaching experience in the area of certification. Depending on the state's working definition of the term "student teaching," this policy is unlikely to offer much flexibility for teachers prepared in district-based alternate route programs.

Louisiana is a participant in the NASDTEC Interstate Agreement, which outlines which other states' certificates will be accepted by the receiving state. This agreement is not a collection of two-way reciprocal acceptances, nor is it a guarantee that all certificates will be accepted by the receiving state, and it is therefore not included in this analysis.

Citation

Louisiana Administrative Code Title 28, Bulletin 746, Section 305, 309 RS 17:3886

Recommendations for Louisiana

Require evidence of effective teaching when determining eligibility for full certification.
To facilitate the movement of effective teachers between states, Louisiana should require that evidence of teacher effectiveness, as determined by an evaluation that includes objective measures of student growth, be considered for all out-of-state candidates. Such evidence should indeed be a factor for candidates who come from states that make student growth an important factor of a teacher evaluation, especially in a state such as Louisiana, which requires evidence of student growth to be the preponderant criterion of its teacher evaluations (see "Evaluation of Effectiveness" analysis).

To uphold standards, require that teachers coming from other states meet testing requirements.
Louisiana should insist that out-of-state teachers meet its own testing requirements, and it should not provide any waivers of its teacher tests unless an applicant can provide evidence of a passing score under its own standards. This is especially important when it comes to out-of-state teachers who have passed content tests that do not rise to the level of Louisiana’s standard, such as an elementary content test that requires a passing score on each content core subject (see "Elementary Teacher Preparation" analysis and recommendations). 

Offer a standard license to certified out-of-state teachers, absent unnecessary requirements. 
Louisiana should reconsider its recency requirement regarding experience, as it may deter talented teachers from applying for certification. 

Accord the same license to out-of-state alternate route teachers as would be accorded to traditionally prepared teachers. 
Regardless of whether a teacher was prepared through a traditional or alternate route, all certified out-of-state teachers should receive equal treatment. State policies that discriminate against teachers who were prepared in an alternate route are not supported by evidence. In fact, a substantial body of research has failed to discern differences in effectiveness between alternate and traditional route teachers.

State response to our analysis

Louisiana was helpful in providing NCTQ with facts that enhanced this analysis. The state asserted that out-of-state teachers are eligible for the Professional Level 1 certificate upon passing all parts of the Praxis exam(s) required for Louisiana certification. However, those granted the waiver from the Praxis I Core Academic Skills tests in reading, writing and math and the Principles of Learning and Teaching pedagogy exam are still required to pass the Praxis content exam aligned to the area of their program in order to achieve highly qualified status for that area. 

Louisiana also noted that its Out-of-State (OS) certificate requires that applicants have been a regularly employed teacher for at least one semester or 90 consecutive days within the five-year period immediately preceding first employment in Louisiana or application for a Louisiana certificate. Lacking this experience in the last five years, the teacher may be issued a one-year OS certificate while completing six semester hours of education-related, refresher coursework required for issuance of the three-year OS certificate.