Miss. education stories to watch this school year
Stories illustrating financial challenges and the pressure to locate qualified teachers will once again draw headlines in education coverage this year.
Such narratives are expected in a state with long-standing regional teacher shortages and where lawmakers since 2009 have spent $2 billion less than what the state’s education funding formula calls for.
With a state task force exploring whether the Mississippi Department of Education should regulate standardized test prep and the pending release of school accountability grades, the 2019 school year will also bring a spate of new headlines.
Here are a few storylines to follow:
What happened to Mississippi’s Achievement School District?
Mississippi’s plan for improving lowperforming districts has yet to take stride.
In 2017, the state submitted a proposal to the U.S. Department of Education detailing an achievement district that would absorb chronically failing districts with the end goal of improving academic results. The effort modeled after a Tennessee initiative was originally planned for operation starting in the 2019 school year.
Although two districts — Noxubee County Schools, which has since been taken over by the state under a separate law, and Humphreys County — were named for possible placement, state education officials have struggled to find a leader for the achievement district. That means Humphreys County will remain under local control for the near future. It also raises questions about the feasibility of the state’s master plan to aid struggling districts.