re: The Advocate finally asks the question: Too many universities in La?

At the very least every 4 year institution should be paired with one or more LCTCS schools in the area and have all remedial and many entry level courses that are taught at the LCTCS school be done through the LCTCS school, or at least as much as possible, instead of being taught at both schools.

The LCTCS school, when possible, should be using graduate level students from the 4 year university to teach the remedial courses (obviously cannot go wholesale due to acceditation standards requiring sufficient # of master and phds level educators).

This reduces the duplication of services (extra cost to state) in a region and reduces employment costs for both schools.

These are essentially state agencies and not independent entities like municipalities, therefore there is no reason that the State through the Board of Regents shouldn't seek to promote collaboration and avoidance of duplication where possible to reduce the costs to the State.

There should be three higher education boards; one for four year universities and professional schools, LCTCS, and the Board of Regents to coordinate between the two. I'd let LSU BR and its satellite entities (Pennington, etc) be its own deal, but LSU-A, LSU-E, an LSU-S all get moved into LCTCS as 2 year schools. Cut unnecessary administration costs. Southern doesn't need its own system and accompanying administration; Grambling is part of the ULS after all.

Finally, its possible to combine schools without closing campuses by having one set of administration for multiple campuses (ULL and McNeese could share administration for all I care, and as a McNeese and LSU grad, I otherwise loath ULL , but keep both campuses open). The higher administration costs (6-7 Figure Salaries) are the bigger issue rather than faculty and staff duplication costs (which can be addressed as stated above).

Essentially, lets work on making them more efficient before going all out closure.