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Initiatives Included In
The Mississippi State Board of Education's
Quality Education Act of 2008
Click on the initiatives below to see details.
Click here to see status of bills related to the Quality Education Act.
Full Funding of the Mississippi Adequate Education Program
The Mississippi Adequate Education Program (MAEP) is a law that provides a formula that ensures an adequate (level 3) education for every Mississippi child whether that child lives in a “wealthy” community or a “poor” one. It is designed to provide schools the resources necessary for adequate student achievement. During the 2007 session, the Legislature fully funded MAEP for the first time since its inception. While this was an important step forward for Mississippi’s schools, MAEP must be fully funded each year to provide schools with the stable funding source that is necessary for long-term planning.
The MAEP provides funding for:
· Teacher and other district employee salaries, retirement and insurance
· Textbooks and other instructional materials
· Basic operational costs (utilities, facility maintenance, etc.)
The MAEP does not include funding for:
· Transportation (operation of buses)
· Special education
· Vocational education
· Gifted education
· Teacher supplies
· Increases in insurance premiums
· Building funds for facility maintenance and improvement
· Salary increases mandated by the legislature for the next fiscal year
· School improvement programs
The History of MAEP
In 1997, the Mississippi Legislature passed the Mississippi Adequate Education Program (MAEP) in an attempt to address two primary problems: low student achievement and inequity among school districts.
In 1997, Mississippi school children were being outperformed by children in other states. Almost every other state was spending more per student than was Mississippi, though most of those states faced fewer challenges.
In addition, Mississippi school districts in communities with a low tax base were significantly worse off than those in more prosperous communities. More affluent communities were able to supplement their state funding, thus affording their children a better education than was offered children who happened to reside in poorer districts. This resulted in a system of education with great inequities and in which geography determined the level of education a Mississippi child received.
After two years of study by consultants, legislators and other experts, the Legislature drafted and passed (over a governor’s veto) two pieces of legislation: the Mississippi Accountability System and the Mississippi Adequate Education Program (MAEP).
The Mississippi Accountability System raised significantly the standards teachers and students were required to meet. The Mississippi Curriculum Test (MCT) was developed to measure student achievement, and schools were rated on a scale of one to five based on students’ scores. The accountability system tied teachers’ careers to the success of their students: if a teacher consistently had disproportionate numbers of students fail to perform well on the MCT, the teacher lost his or her job. The same went for principals.
The Mississippi Adequate Education Program is a promise by legislators to provide teachers and schools the resources necessary to bring students up to the standards required by the accountability system. The accountability program requires “successful” or “level three” performance, and the MAEP provides a formula that determines the funding necessary to produce “level three” programs. This law also provides a ceiling on the portion of that funding a local school district is required to provide.
The MAEP is intended to erase earlier inequities by ensuring children in every region of Mississippi an adequate, or level three, education – even those children who happen to reside in poor districts. The formula determines the per-student cost of a level three education, then subtracts the local district’s responsibility. The difference is the level of funding the law requires the state to provide our public schools.
While the accountability standards have been kept in place, and students, principals and teachers are held to those levels of achievement, legislators, year after year, have excused themselves from meeting the requirements of their own law. They simply do not fund public education at the level required by the formula – the level to which they hold teachers and schools accountable.
Cost: $2.5-million
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Restoration of Diverted Funds
Public School Building Funds
The state is required by statute to appropriate $20-million per year to the Public School Building Fund. These funds are available to assist school districts in making repairs to existing facilities or in constructing new ones. In each of the past 6 years, the $20-million that should have gone into this fund was diverted to help pay for the Mississippi Adequate Education Program (MAEP).
Many of our state’s schools have fallen into disrepair, and funds have not been available to assist districts in maintaining or constructing facilities. This initiative in the Quality Education Act would cease the diversion of those funds and ensure that they be appropriated to the Public School Building Fund as required by law.
Cost: $20-million as required by current statute
Teacher Supply Funds
Similarly, state statute requires that $20-million per year be appropriated to the Education Enhancement Fund to cover the cost of classroom supplies. A portion of this sales tax diversion into the Education Enhancement Fund has been absorbed into MAEP for 5 of the last 7 years. Because of this, districts have not had the resources needed for instructional supplies. This portion of the Quality Education Act would ensure that $20-million per year be appropriated for classroom supplies as required by law.
Cost: $20-million as required by current statute
Improved Training for School Board Members
School boards govern our local school districts. They oversee multi-million-dollar budgets, adopt curriculum, and make policy that influences every facet of our children’s education. This level of responsibility requires the most talented and dedicated among us as well as a demonstrated commitment to the very highest standards of education.
The Role of School Boards
The Mississippi School Boards Association defines the role of the school board as follows:
A member of a school board is a member of a policy making board. The board addresses the operation of the school district through a set of policy statements that include topics ranging from the legal status of the school district to the relations with other governmental agencies. The policies are those positions that the board has taken that give the administrative staff of the district direction that it needs to operate the district on a day to day basis.
The board member is not directly responsible for the day to day operations of the school district but leaves issues and problems to be resolved through the proper channels of the school organization. The board handles issues and problems only at the board meeting level and only after all other avenues of resolution have been exhausted.
The school board member is a defender of public education in general and of his/her school district in particular, learning basic information about all of the district's offerings, options and successes as they relate to the curriculum, co-curricular activities and interscholastic activities.
MS Code §37-7-301 provides a detailed listing of many of the powers and duties of the school board. This is not an all inclusive list. Other powers and duties appear in other sections of the MS Code dealing with such matters as sixteenth section land management, employment of staff, nonrenewal and dismissal of staff, budget hearings, adoption and approval of the budget, unexpired term fulfillment and numbers of other duties.
Proposed Changes
The Quality Education Act of 2008 proposes legislation to enhance the training of local school board members and provide assurance that board members demonstrate the ability to execute the duties inherent in this important office.
Cost: No or minimal cost to the state
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Appointed Superintendents
While the majority of Mississippi’s superintendents are appointed (hired) by the school board, ours is one of only three states that continue to elect superintendents in some school districts. Mississippi elects 65 superintendents out of some 147 superintendents elected among Mississippi, Alabama and Florida. While many of our elected superintendents are extremely effective, there are problems inherent in this selection process. These include:
- A very limited pool from which to draw. A person must be a resident of the school district in order to run for the seat. When superintendents are appointed (hired) they can be recruited from anywhere in the country or the world.
- Accountability. When a superintendent is elected, the superintendent is not directly answerable to the school board (they cannot fire him/her).
- Bias in decision-making. An elected superintendent must fund a campaign, thus creating the potential to feel beholden to or to curry favor from campaign funders and supporters.
Superintendents face challenges unlike those found in virtually any other setting, academic, business or otherwise. Superintendents deal daily with issues as complex and diverse as million-dollar budget management, facilities management, assessment of academic curriculum, and diffusing volatile situations with children, parents, and community leaders. They are charged with the most daunting of tasks: educating our future doctors, attorneys, CEOs and world leaders. Because Mississippi’s school leaders face challenges greater than those in any other state, it is critical that we attract leaders of impeccable quality. This level of quality can only be attained when we ensure a broad field of highly qualified candidates and remove politics from the equation. Further, superintendents should not be distracted with campaigns for re-election and political fundraisers. They should be about the business of educating children each and every day.
No Threat to Currently Elected Superintendents
The proposal in the Quality Education Act of 2008 would phase in the appointment of superintendents in all school districts and would not threaten the employment of any currently elected superintendent. Sitting elected superintendents could continue to run for office until retiring, resigning or being defeated. Upon the retirement or resignation of any currently elected superintendent, the office would become appointed. Were the sitting superintendent to be defeated in an election, the newly elected superintendent would serve a 4-year term at which time the position would become appointed. The currently serving superintendent would then be eligible for appointment to the position.
High Quality School Boards Necessary
Because appointed superintendents are hired by school boards and school boards develop the overall goals, strategic plans and policies for the district, it is imperative that local school boards be of exceptional quality. Parents and citizens are encouraged to become educated about the quality and inner workings of their local boards and to insist that they operate in a professional and efficient manner. The Quality Education Act of 2008 addresses improved training for local school board members to ensure that districts are successful.
Cost: No cost to the state
Research has consistently shown the quality of the teacher in the classroom to be the number-one factor in student achievement. A high-quality teacher can produce amazing results for even academically-challenged students, while a poor teacher can cause academic lags that require years of intervention to overcome.
The benefits associated with being taught by good teachers are cumulative. Research indicates that the achievement gap widens each year between students with the most effective teachers and those with the least effective teachers. This suggests that the most significant gains in student achievement will likely be realized when students receive instruction from good teachers over consecutive years.
Mississippi currently suffers a severe teacher shortage that makes it difficult for districts to hire high-quality teachers for all positions. The current state teacher salary schedule encourages early retirement because salary increment increases end after 25 years of service. If Mississippi is to attract and retain good teachers, we must offer competitive salaries and we must keep effective veteran teachers in our schools.
Fast Facts About Mississippi Teachers
Mississippi is suffering a severe teacher shortage.
- 47 Mississippi school districts are considered to be Critical Teacher Shortage areas.
- Mississippi has about 2,000 teacher vacancies per year.
- 1,424 teacher education majors graduated in 2005-2006; of those, 1,030 were licensed; only 900 of those licensed stayed in Mississippi to teach.
- Approximately 6,000 Mississippi teachers are eligible to retire.
- Nationally, 50% of all beginning teachers leave the field within 5 years.
- The average teacher salary in Mississippi is $40,594 compared to $47,602 nationally.
- Mississippi ranks 45th in the nation for teacher pay.
- The most recent national teacher salary survey, released in March of this year, indicates that the national average teacher salary in 2004-05 was $47,602. In 2004-05, the average teacher salary in Mississippi was $38,212. Due to salary increases passed by the Legislature, the average teacher salary in Mississippi in 2005-06 increased to $40,594. National salary averages are not yet available for 2005-06.
This initiative calls for a 3% increase to base teacher salaries and the addition of incremental increases for teachers with 26 to 30 years of experience. (Teachers with 2 – 25 years currently receive the incremental increases, but under current law those increases cease after 25 years.)
Cost: $48.4-million
Pilot Pre-Kindergarten Programs
Mississippi faces a critical problem with children who arrive in kindergarten without the basic skills necessary for learning to take place. Many of these children arrive with no concept of a letter, a number or a shape; they do not understand that text conveys meaning. Many have no idea even how to hold a book.
In fact, a study of the children in Mississippi’s Reading First Schools showed that a full 60% of Mississippi children who entered those programs had vocabularies significantly below their age level, and many of them entered K with the vocabulary of a 1- or 2-year-old child. Teachers of Mississippi children note with regularity that they have children who entered kindergarten with a 20-word vocabulary.
Children who arrive in kindergarten without the basic skills necessary to learn typically are being reared in poverty by parents who themselves have very low levels of education. According to Meaningful Differences in the Every Day Experience of Young American Children (Hart and Risley. 1995), a child reared in poverty will have heard 30 to 40 million fewer words by the time he or she begins kindergarten than will a child reared in an affluent home. In other words, many Mississippi children aren’t at the starting line when the race starts.
Head Start: The Misconceptions
A common misconception is that Head Start is available to all children growing up in poverty. Unfortunately, this is not the case. The income requirements to qualify for Head Start are very stringent, and many children in poverty do not qualify.
In 2007, a single parent with one child was required to have a gross income below $13,690/year to qualify for Head Start. So, if the single parent with one child made $13,700, the child did not qualify to attend Head Start. The income of a single parent with two children could not exceed $17,170 per year. It is probably safe to say that this parent’s income would not allow him/her to send the child to preschool. It is estimated that between 5,000 and 8,000 Mississippi children in each age group fall into this category. These are the kids who are “falling through the cracks.”
Fast Facts: The Abecedarian Project
Research has shown that when children are provided high quality pre-kindergarten when they are 3 and 4 years old…
- They have higher cognitive test scores from the toddler years to age 21
- Their academic achievement in both reading and math is higher from the primary grades through young adulthood
- They are involved less frequently in the criminal justice system
- They complete more years of education and are more likely to attend a four-year college
- They are older, on average, when their first child is born
Source: The Abecedarian Project; University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
More Fast Facts About Early Childhood Education
- Mississippi is one of only 12 states that have no pre-k – and the only southern state without pre-k -National Institute for Early Education Research's State of Preschool 2006 shows 12 states with no state funding of Pre-K: Alaska, Hawaii, Idaho, Indiana, Mississippi, Montana, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Utah, Wyoming
- Of all states, Mississippi has among the highest percentages of working moms with children under 5 years of age (more than 61%)
- Current licensure for preschools is under the Department of Health; thus, many pre-k programs are custodial rather than educational
A Step in the Right Direction
In the last legislative session, the Legislature passed The Early Learning Collaborative Act of 2007 which authorizes a voluntary Early Care and Education Grant Program. This program is a collaborative effort involving private licensed child care, public school and Head Start programs that is aimed at improving the access children of the working poor have to quality early childhood education. Also, legislation passed in the 2006 session expanded the Mississippi Child Care Quality Step System to provide incentives to programs that improve their quality, and also expanded the Statewide Child Care Resource and Referral System to provide training for pre-k teachers. The Legislature failed, however, to provide the funding necessary to implement the programs. The initiative called for in The Quality Education Act of 2008 will provide the funding necessary for successful implementation of those programs. This proposed pre-K program is NOT mandatory and it is not an “extra grade” of public schooling.
Excellent Return on Investment
Done well, an Early Childhood Education program will provide the best investment possible of state tax dollars, bar none. A recent Southern Education Foundation report (pp. 14 & 15) cited reports by the Business Roundtable, the Committee for Economic Development and the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis demonstrating that high-quality pre-k programs provide the best of any long-term investment for economic growth. The following is an excerpt from that report:
In recent years, economists and business groups across the nation have begun to document the importance of early childhood education as an investment in economic development. In the last couple of years, for example, the Business Roundtable (representing America’s top 500 corporations), the Committee for Economic Development (a 60-year-old national business group), and the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis have issued reports demonstrating that high-quality Pre-k programs provide the best long-term investment for economic growth. In their words, the economic return “on investment from early childhood development is extraordinary.” Pre-K offers “greater potential returns and substantially less risk” than state subsidies and incentives that try to attract plant locations, company headquarters, office towers, entertainment centers or professional sports stadiums and arenas.
Cost: $20-million
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Decreased Bond Passage Rate from 60% to 55%
State law currently requires a 60% majority vote to pass a local school bond issue – more than is required to elect the governor or any other elected official, and more than is required to amend our state’s constitution. Most states require only a simple majority.
Legislators have been reluctant to fund schools at an adequate level and monies have been diverted from the public school building fund year after year. Many Mississippi children attend school in facilities that are not conducive to learning and, in some cases, pose safety hazards. Many districts have outgrown their current facilities and, being unable to afford new buildings or additions, are holding classes in hallways and portable units. Mississippi’s failure to provide our school children a welcoming environment that is conducive to learning sends the wrong message to our youth. Our message should be: education is our priority.
The unreasonable 60% burden makes it impossible for many districts to build desperately needed facilities or to repair existing ones. This initiative would change state law to require only 55% of the vote to pass a school bond issue – still more than is required by most states. Had the passage rate been 55% in previous years, over half of the failed bond issues in the last 10 years would have succeeded. This slight change in the current statute will enable many districts to build safe and efficient schools for their children.
Cost: No cost to the state
Continued Funding for High School Redesign
Redesigning Education for the 21st Century Workforce in Mississippi is a comprehensive initiative designed to increase graduation rates, better prepare students for higher education and for the workforce, and to improve the quality and quantity of the workforce. Pilot sites for the program were funded during the 2007 Legislative Session. Additional funding is needed to sustain the pilot sites and expand the program.
Under the Redesign Plan, students are given greater direction at the middle school level to prepare for entering the workforce or post-secondary education. In seventh and eighth grade, students take Information and Communication Technology I and II, which help students understand how to use technology to solve problems and how to use technology once they enter the workforce. In ninth grade, students take a Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) Applications course, which exposes students to rigorous technology application tools and prepares them to solve real-world, industry-specific problems. They are required to take an online course in ninth grade.
In high school, students can choose from seven career pathways:
- Health Care
- Agriculture and Natural Resources
- Construction and Manufacturing
- Transportation
- Business Management and Marketing
- Science, Technology, Engineering and Math
- Human Services
These seven pathways were developed by looking at where the job growth is and will be and how best to prepare these students to enter these jobs. Some will enter their careers by obtaining a four-year degree; some will enter their careers by going to a community college; others will enter the workforce directly from high school. Students must be prepared for each of these three entry levels. The Redesign Plan represents a major shift in thinking that will prepare students for the careers they choose.
Cost: $18.3-million
Additional Funding for At-Risk Students
Mississippi has one of the greatest populations of at-risk students (over 60%), yet we provide one of the lowest levels of funding for additional services necessary to bring these students to a successful level of achievement. This initiative in the Quality Education Act recognizes that more resources are required to educate students reared in poverty and those who face learning challenges and that programs are needed to address the needs of all students who struggle academically. During the 2007 Legislative Session, a study commission was formed to evaluate and report on at-risk funding and other learning challenges. This initiative will reflect the findings of that commission, which are expected to be issued in November 2007. Additional targeted resources should be distributed based upon specific program guidelines designed to improve student achievement among struggling students, and programs should have built-in accountability measures.
Cost: No specific request
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