OJ Moving To OHS
BOBBY ARDOIN
St. Landry Now.com Editor
The St. Landry Parish School District administrative staff is being tasked with moving nearly 300 Opelousas Junior High School students to Opelousas High for the 2026-27 academic year.
Board members voted 9-3 with an abstention on Tuesday night to approve the across-town transition following a Recovery School District mandate which cited seven consecutive years of failing state performance scored at OJHS, which educates seventh and eighth grade students on their Market Street campus.
Current District enrollment shows that OHS could have as many as 869 students on campus in August once the move is completed.
Superintendent Milton Batiste III told board members that state officials are not giving the parish school system much of a choice.
Batiste referred Finance Committee members to a Feb. 19 letter from the Louisiana Department of Education in which RSD Superintendent Pam Schooler indicated the RSD was seeking to intervene with what she described as “an academic crisis” concerning OJHS.
“Opelousas Junior High School, within the St. Landry Parish School System has received a letter grade of “F” for seven consecutive years,” Schooler wrote.
Schooler added in the letter that the District “shall” merge Opelousas Junior High School and Opelousas Senior High School into a single, consolidated school serving grades 7-12, operating under the administration and site code designation of Opelousas High School.
“Opelousas Junior High School has been deemed academically unacceptable, therefore, the St. Landry Parish School Board is required to adopt and submit a reconstitution plan,” the letter says.
Schooler added that it is “imperative” that the Board adopt a plan by March 11. Schooler added that failure to meet the conditions of the RSD mandate “would compel the RSD to take more assertive action within the score of authority regarding the takeover of failing schools and buildings.”
Batiste told the Committee that if the Board did not act on the RSD plan, the District risked having OJHS operated by the state and possibly becoming a charter school.
Board members Anthony Standberry, Hazel Sias and Timmakah Hardy voted against moving the OJHS students to OHS, while Bianca Vedell abstained.
Discussion on the issue often proved contentious among board members and individuals who spoke at the meeting.
Sias said the state should provide the District with an opportunity to submit an alternative plan.
“All we are doing is moving students from one school to another. That’s not helping our kids, except settling them up for further failure,” said Sias.
Batiste said with junior high school students on the OHS campus, there is a chance at providing the seventh and eighth grade students with more academic help in addition to opportunities for participating in more extracurricular activities.
OJHS would move students to OHS, which is a “C”-rated SPS school, Batiste said.
Standberry argued that OHS already has on-campus problems, while Vedell complained that the Board wasn’t provided with more time in considering the edict from the RSD.
