Louisiana's Public Higher Education Problem Solved

The only Tier One public schools in Louisiana are:

1. LSU
2. Louisiana Tech

This is one A&M University and one STEM University. Both are essential if a State expects to produce a workforce that will attract modern companies.

Based on national rankings versus funding given by the state, several of these other universities are in need of being consolidated/shut-down. I would imagine in a state as conservative as Louisiana, we should be able to sell the fact "life isn't fait, not everyone gets to go to college, especially within 60 miles of their home" argument.

Schools that can be consolidated:

McNeese, Southeastern, and Nichols. Merge them into ULL to provide an alternative public university for South Louisiana, given its larger population. Not sure why we need three of these third-tier schools in South LA when we just need one alternative.

Schools that need to be shut-down due to poor performance:

1. ULM; if there are any desirable programs, you can keep them in Ruston; ULM has long been one chin-beard away from being a community college; in fact, given the economically-depressed state of the city, turn their facilities into trade school to produce more blue collar workers. Have you ever met a ULM student? Trust me, they give college a bad name

2. HBCUs: Grambling and Southern need to be shut down for a million obvious reasons. When people talk about merging them into Tech and LSU respectively, maybe certain programs, but it is a non-argument because most of these students could not be admitted unless you relax the standards. Therefore, trade school should be a more viable option.

So that leaves 3 main State Universities, LSU, Louisiana Tech, and Louisiana (or whatever we would call it with the merger; properly naming it after the state would actually make sense in this case).

All three serve a distinct purpose, which is to produce a viable workforce that will allow Louisiana to compete nationally for companies.