Feb. 12, 2026
From Conference Floors To Classroom Wins
Two decades of conference halls, classroom breakthroughs, and late-night planning come to life as we sit down with Ranay Lozala of Rapides Parish at LACUE 2025 in New Orleans. From board service to district leadership in data and analytics, Renee shares how a statewide conference becomes more than sessions and swag—it becomes a pipeline of ideas, tools, and guardrails that shape learning on Monday morning.
Website: spotlight4success.com
00:06 - Welcome And Guest Introduction
00:44 - Why LACUE Still Matters
01:45 - Sessions, Vendors, And Classroom Impact
02:45 - The Cell Phone Ban Debate
04:55 - SIS Tools And Founders’ Legacy
08:14 - Meet-Cute At A Conference
WEBVTT
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Welcome to Spotlight for Success by American Book Company.
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I am Devin Pentez, your host.
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We are here at LACU 2025 in New Orleans, Louisiana.
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We are so excited to have our special guest here today, Renee Losada.
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And uh she is here uh with us uh from Rapids Parish.
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Uh she is a uh um uh involved in data and analytics, and we're so excited you're able to join us today.
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Welcome, Renee.
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Hi good to be here.
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Great, Renee.
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Tell me a bit about what brings you here to LACU.
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Well, what brings me to LaCue is I have been coming to LaCue since probably 2003.
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Wow.
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Maybe almost kind of a few years after LACU started.
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Uh my director at that time and a number of other directors, they were the original founders of LaCue.
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Wow.
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They were, and we've been with it all since it's really been all over the state.
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You've seen a lot of changes.
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I have a lot of changes.
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Some for the good, some for the okay.
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Okay we're doing that this year, but they're all good.
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I've actually served on the LacU board for a couple of years.
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Tell me, uh tell me, you've seen so much, you know, over so many years.
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Uh what keeps you coming back every year, and you're like, wow, this is so great.
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I love interacting with uh teachers and the people from the other districts that kind of do the same thing I do.
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I love hearing their perspective.
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I love talking to the vendors.
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I love the vendors that we use and the vendors that we haven't used yet.
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Um they're just amazing.
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The sessions are wonderful.
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I mean, you just you don't get that sometimes at regular PD.
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You don't get the quick interactions and stuff.
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And I love sessions that most of the presenters allow you to ask questions.
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And a lot of I've seen a lot of the teachers that have questions on, oh, how do we do this in our classroom, how do we do this in our classroom, and they get such great ideas coming back from the queue.
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Sometimes I'm always a little scared when the teachers come back from the queue because they've seen so much great stuff and they're like, I want to do this in the classroom, I want to do this in the classroom.
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And unfortunately, I'm at the district and I'm like, oh, do you have PII with the code?
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That's right.
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You gotta have that, you gotta have the protection, right?
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Yes.
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So important.
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Um, that's great.
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So is there a particular session, speaking of sessions, that you're like, wow, that was so intriguing, like you really enjoyed it.
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Yes, um, I enjoy enjoyed, excuse me, Cheryl Abshire's session on the banning of cell phones.
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It is really scary what um what is looking like could happen.
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And uh people are scared about screen time and kids on screen time, and you get a couple of people in a board meeting with a couple of people that may not know the whole story, and things can get wiped out just really quickly without knowing the whole story, so um they're not quite aware of the structured use of technology in the classroom, and so I enjoyed that one.
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I also have attended a lot of on-course dis uh sessions, which that is our systems uh information, our student information system, which is what I work with.
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So working with the SIS.
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Yes, but as I said, my most favorite so far has been Dr.
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Abshar session.
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Oh, wonderful.
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And she's along with one of the founding members of Lake.
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Oh, that's great.
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Thank you for watching.
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Spotlight for success.
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I am David, the chief operating officer of American Company.
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We are located here in our headquarters in Georgia.
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Uh, do you have a story you can share?
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You're like, that was so fun when we did this.
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Uh that was so fun when I did that this year, uh any other year.
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Any year.
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Can I tell you a story?
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I want to hear a story.
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Maybe it's not technically about Lacoue, but it is about Lakie.
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So I worked in another district.
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I used to work in Sabine Parish.
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And uh my first Lakue was in Rapids Parish because we used to do this in uh central Louisiana because it was just kind of easy for everyone to get there before it got so big.
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And um we were we used to have this every night, about this night, we would have what was called a Couchon Delay, which most people know what that is, and there would be a band that played, and while I was standing in line to get my food from our Couchon Dela for the from the Couchant, there was a gentleman standing behind me, and my director was in front of me, and she turned around and she introduced him and she said he said, Hey, Renee, this is Jose.
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And I said, Hi, Jose, and he didn't look at me and he turned away.
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If I I I married him three or four years later.
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Look at that.
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It was a small world, so that is a silly story.
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So you met him before you met him?
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I met him before I met him, yeah.
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Yeah, he's he says he he he did look at me.
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I said, no, I don't think he did.
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Oh wow So, but uh just the learning of such I I can say like the systems of information so system that we use now on course, that when I met them at LaCue they just they blew my socks off.
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And a a lot of things here have.
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I mean, just different uh different people that we've met.
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Uh I work with we work with Howard Computer a lot and they are an awesome group to work with.
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We work with Traferra, we work with and and some companies have you know converge, change names and stuff like that, so I can't remember them all, but we do have a good interaction with our vendors and I really get to enjoy getting to meet them here.
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Oh, that's wonderful.
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Although they enjoy getting to meet my husband more because he's the director of technology.
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Oh, okay.
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Wonderful.
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So but anyway.
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Oh, that's great.
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You keep it all in the family and uh you go out there and help all these lifelong learners and these uh student learners.
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We do work.
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Teachers are amazing.
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Yeah.
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Uh we've enjoyed working with the teachers so much because I get to my former job as a pre-K teacher, I worked with a bunch of four-year-olds.
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But now I get to do PD and stuff with the teachers, although I don't not as much now because I'm hitting in my twilight years.
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But I have enjoyed helping them and watching them learn.
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I mean, I've gone from a teacher trying to put a mouse on the floor to use it as a pedal for a to use it as a pedal for like a sewing machine to using it on the hand, so now they don't and the teachers coming in today, they're so knowledgeable in technology.
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Where back in 2000s the teachers were like, Okay, what is this?
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Yeah, how do I turn this on?
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And like you has helped them learn how to turn it on and different things they can do with it, which is awesome.
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That's awesome.
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That's great to hear, Renee.
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Well, we appreciate what you do, you know, all that data systems, data work, and and protection of student data and all of that is so important.
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It is, it is, and we work closely with the State Department because we are the um we're the people I like to say we're accountants, only we don't account money, we account kids and teachers and classes and stuff.
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So sometimes we have to do the yuck work where we're like, okay, this tea you gotta have these schedules and everything done, and we have to do a lot of the back work that people don't think about and it's kind of yuck sometimes.
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But in the end, when all our kids are in school and and everybody's happy, which never happens in education, but when everybody is 75% happy, okay, everything is good.
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Oh, that's wonderful, Renee.
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Uh, do you have anything you'd like to share with the LACU audience?
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Uh thank y'all for coming to this LACU.
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I have enjoyed meeting y'all.
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Uh thank you, LACU board.
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Y'all have done an excellent job in preparing for this conference.
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I do know how hard it is.
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Thank you, vendors, for participating because it takes a lot.
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I know for y'all to pack all the stuff down here, depending on where you live.
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It takes a lot to pack all this stuff down here and pack it all back, and it just takes a lot.
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And I appreciate the teachers that attend.
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And I appreciate the board because as I said, they work hard.
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I know they don't just start working three days before Lake Hugh, they've worked all year.
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And the as I said, the teachers that attend and vendors, they've just done an excellent job.
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The hotel's done an excellent job of accommodating.
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Oh he's awesome.
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That is so awesome.
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So happy to hear that.
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Again, thank you for joining us, Renee Lozada with uh Rapids Parish.
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Thank you for being here with us today.
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Thank you.
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