Recovery School District (RSD) is a special statewide school district administered by the Louisiana Department of Education. Created by legislation passed in 2003, the RSD is designed to take underperforming schools and transform and make them effective in educating children. While the majority of RSD-supervised schools were within New Orleans and were largely under the administration of the Orleans Parish School Board pre-Katrina, the RSD has also taken over schools in East Baton Rouge, Caddo and Pointe Coupee parishes, reflecting its statewide authority and full name, the Recovery School District of Louisiana (RSDLA). As of 2012 it was the fifth largest school district in Louisiana by student population. Orleans parish schools returned the OPSB in 2018. The Recovery School District's supervisory board is Louisiana Board of Elementary and Secondary Education (BESE). The RSD has two offices, the one in New Orleans serves schools in Greater New Orleans and the one in Baton Rouge serves other areas. History During the 2003 regular legislative session, the Louisiana Legislature passed Act 9 to create the Recovery School District (RSD) to take over the operations of failing schools, defined as schools that do not meet the minimum academic standards for at least four consecutive years. The legislation was signed into law in May of that year by Governor of Louisiana Kathleen Blanco. Pierre Capdau School in New Orleans became the state's first takeover school in 2004, and subsequently became Louisiana's first RSD charter school, known as a Type 5 charter school. In August 2004, the school opened as Pierre Capdau-UNO Charter School under the management of the New Beginnings Foundation and the University of New Orleans. In the spring of 2005, four additional New Orleans schools were taken over by the state, and turned over to charter school operators: Medard Nelson, Samuel Green, Phillips, and Sophie B. Wright. Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans on August 29, 2005, bringing near total devastation to the city and damaging or destroying more than 100 of the city's 128 school buildings. In the face of uncertainties about the future of schools in the city, the Louisiana Legislature acted by passing Act 35. Eventually, the Recovery School District (RSD) took over 102 out of 126 schools from the Orleans Parish School Board (OPSB) in late-November 2005. Of the remaining 24 schools, seven were uninhabitable, 12 became charters, and five remained directly managed by OPSB. In 2018, the RSD schools