Mississippi lawmakers will be able to say they “fully funded” public education while spending about $90 million less than what the current law calls for if a Senate proposal to change the formula for calculating what “full funding” means becomes law.
The Legislature created the Mississippi Adequate Education Program in 1997 with the stated goal of ensuring all Mississippi children would receive an “adequate” education whether they attended school in a low-income or high-income community. Since that time, the State has only met the law’s requirements for fully funding education twice, most recently in 2008.
In its education appropriations bill, the Senate included enough funds to meet the new, lower threshold for “fully funding” public education that House Bill 1369 creates. Even so, because the old funding targets are not being met, the State would still wind up spending about $181 million more on education than it currently does over the next year if the bill becomes law. If lawmakers were to fully fund MAEP under the current law, they would need to spend $261 million more than they currently do.
Under MAEP, the State pays for the difference between what a local community is able to contribute and the cost per student multiplied by the district’s average daily attendance. MAEP requires a recalculation of the cost per student, or the base student cost, every four years. In the interim years, the state uses a formula based on annual inflation to determine increases in funding, but the new bill would significantly revise that approach by using a 20-year average instead of annual inflation figures.
The Mississippi Senate Education Committee inserted the changes to the MAEP formula into House Bill 1369 with an amendment on Tuesday, and the full Senate passed it by a 52-0 vote later that day. The Senate also passed the increased funding bill unanimously the same day. Both bills return to the House for concurrence or possible negotiations.
Senate Changes Inflation Calculations
The current MAEP formula determines how much a school district receives by multiplying average daily attendance in the district by the base student cost with