UNO's future
PLUS: Ten commandments, new laws
Before I jump into this week’s post, I’d like to offer an apology for my silence these last weeks. The back half of the legislative session hit me pretty hard and my mental health went into a sharp decline. Now that we’re past it, I’m rebounding and will do my best not to drop the ball for a while. Thanks as always for y’alls readership and support.
Now, the news.
Whether the University of New Orleans will retain its status as a research university after it rejoins the LSU system is uncertain, LSU System President Wade Rousse said.
Rousse said restoring the UNO’s financial stability is a priority as it becomes LSU New Orleans on July 1.
“I think that faculty is committed to remaining and keeping the [research] status,” Rousse said in an interview. “… From my perspective, from the system level, I worry about finances, so we are 100% focused on how do we increase revenue, how do we manage expenses.”
UNO is the only public research university in New Orleans and one of five public colleges in Louisiana to earn a research ranking from the Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education. UNO’s R2 rating denotes “high” research activity, one step behind the R1 status LSU and the University of Louisiana at Lafayette hold with “very high” research activity.
Louisiana Tech and Southern University are also R2 schools.
Maintaining UNO’s status as an urban research institution has been a top priority of faculty throughout its move from the University of Louisiana System to LSU.
UNO’s transfer back to the LSU System is happening in response to a long-running enrollment decline at the New Orleans school, which has caused a fiscal crisis. The school had a student body of around 17,000 before Hurricane Katrina, with an immediate drop to around 6,000 after the August 2005 storm. For the fall 2025 semester, its total enrollment was 5,670.
Rousse said LSU New Orleans is on track to enroll 6,000 students for this fall semester.
Last year, the Louisiana Legislature gave the LSU System approximately $20 million to aid in UNO’s transition. Rousse said most of that went toward paying outstanding bills.
Last year, the LSU System restructured to absorb all of its research-intensive campuses into its main campus. The leaders of LSU’s medical schools in New Orleans and Shreveport, the Pennington Biomedical Research Center and the LSU AgCenter now report directly to LSU Chancellor Jim Dalton.
LSU New Orleans is not part of the restructuring. But Rousse said that if LSU is successful in stabilizing UNO, in two or three years it would consider folding the school into its research portfolio.
Ten commandments
Days after most Louisiana university students left campus for the summer, schools across the state began posting the Ten Commandments in vacant classrooms.
The posters, donated by the conservative organization Louisiana Family Forum, have been posted in classrooms across the entire LSU System, the Louisiana Community and Technical College System and at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. A spokeswoman for the Southern University System has not yet responded to a request for comment sent Wednesday as to whether they have been posted in their classrooms.
University of Louisiana System spokeswoman Katie Dawson said all of their campuses have received the posters and would have them posted by the beginning of the fall semester at the latest.
Louisiana lawmakers passed a law in 2024 requiring the Ten Commandments to be posted in every K-12, college and university classroom at schools that accept state money. The law was mired in a legal battle until earlier this year, when the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled it could go into effect.
The statue requires a specific version of the Ten Commandments, one that’s popular among evangelical denominations, to be printed on 11-by-14-inch posters, at minimum, and up to 18-by-24-inches to ensure readability, according to guidance from Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill.
LSU System President Wade Rousse embraced the posters in comments to the media earlier this year.
Louisiana’s public K-12 schools received donated posters from the Louisiana Family Forum earlier this year, The Advocate reported.
Read the full article here
What I’m reading
Louisiana just made it illegal to sue oil companies over climate change. So have other states. By Alex Lubben | The Advocate
UF trustees advance President-elect Stuart Bell to final state board vote By Garrett Shanley | Miami Herald
Superintendents, advocates push back on Landry’s proposed school funding cut By Julie O’Donoghue | Louisiana Illuminator
NC State investigating LSU over Will Wade’s departure. Could legal action be next? By Brian Murphy | WRAL
Paxton’s office threatens legal action if Big 12 penalizes Texas Tech for playing QB who placed bets By Ayden Runnels & Alex Nguyen | Texas Tribune
Higher education law changes
Public universities in Louisiana are walking away from the 2026 legislative session with more authority to increase tuition and fees as well as the ability to punish those responsible for aggressive hazing incidents.
Lawmakers also opened the door to Louisiana leaving the organization from which its college programs have received their academic stamp of approval and possibly joining a conservative alternative.
These and other notable changes are in store for higher education in the state.
Cleo to Southern?
The team tasked with hiring the next Southern University System president is close to finishing its work, its chairman said Thursday.
New Orleans City Councilman Jason Hughes, a Southern graduate and former state representative, said he believes the committee will select finalists within a month. The finalists will then participate in public interviews before the Southern University Board of Supervisors hires somebody for the position.
The committee had originally planned to present candidates to the board in May and have a president installed by July 1. But the committee extended its timeline in May, citing a delay in hiring a search firm.
The extension came just days after the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Louisiana v. Callais, which led Republicans in the state legislature to turn the majority Black congressional district that U.S. Rep. Cleo Fields, D-Baton Rouge, holds into one that favors a Republican candidate. It led to speculation that Fields was in consideration for the presidency.
When asked about that possibility, Hughes said the search committee hasn’t identified any specific individuals for the job. Fields has not yet responded to a request for comment.
“We’ll consider anybody who ultimately decides to apply,” Hughes said. “But I can assure the public this: No one has been promised a job, no politician, no academician, no person within the United States of America, and I can say that with full-fledged confidence.”
My sympathies. Keeping up with what goes down in Baton Rouge hasn't been easy on my mental health, either. It just never stops. :(