On July 18, 2006, Republicans proposed a $100 million national school voucher program that would let low-income children in underperforming schools move to a different public school or a private school, including religious ones.

On May 7, 2013, The Supreme Court of Louisiana ruled that the state’s voucher system was unconstitutional. The court said that the money going towards the program and the private schools the vouchers are used towards should be used towards the public school system instead.

The Rev. Jennifer Jones-Bridgett is executive director the Louisiana chapter of People Improving Communities through Organizing, also known as PICO Louisiana or PICO LIFT (Louisiana Interfaith Together). This network of more than 100 faith communities has developed a “Covenant to Rebuild Louisiana,” which calls for clergy to work together with government leaders.

Douglas Brinkley is a professor of history and director of the Roosevelt Center at Tulane University in New Orleans. He is the author of The Great Deluge: Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans and the Mississippi Gulf Coast (William Morrow, 2006), which tells the story of the great storm through the eyes of its survivors and examines the failures […]

Mark Roseman is a professor of Jewish studies and history at Indiana University in Bloomington, where his specialties include the history of the Holocaust.

Michael Gottsegen is a visiting assistant professor in the Judaic studies program at Brown University n Providence, R.I. He studies the relation between the Jewish religion and public and political life.

Suzanne Stone is a law professor and director of the Center for Jewish Law and Contemporary Civilization at Yeshiva University in New York City.

J. David Bleich is a professor of Jewish law and ethics at Yeshiva University in New York City. He is an expert on Jewish law and bioethics and how Jewish law applies to contemporary issues. He is also conversant in how Jewish law intersects with the American legal system. He is the co-author of Jewish Bioethics and author […]

Michael Berger is an associate professor at the Tam Institute of Jewish Studies at Emory University in Atlanta. Among his areas of expertise are the development of Jewish law and Jewish ethics and the relationship between Judaism and violence.