Jackson Free Press

The Mississippi Economic Council recently completed its 19-city Pathway to Progress listening tour. In each of these meetings, the council polled business and civic leaders about the most important issues facing Mississippi, including education.

Statewide, 83 percent of those polled said the lack of funding for public schools concerns them, and 97 percent said that career and technical education is important.

Clearly, individuals who achieve higher levels of education receive economic benefits. Study after study has shown that those who achieve higher levels of education earn more and have lower unemployment rates than those who do not. But a better-educated populace has societal benefits, too.

A Brookings Institute research paper found that the lack of decent-paying jobs only worsens the challenges of less-educated Americans, which contributes to higher crime rates and more adults receiving government aid such as disability payments and welfare.

The Mississippi Adequate Education Program is the amount of money that the Legislature itself determined necessary to provide every child with the opportunity to receive an "adequate" education.

Currently, on a statewide basis, we are shorting public schools some $257 million annually. Over 10 years, the cumulative shortfall is $1.8 billion. As a result, many school districts don't have enough teachers, computers, books and classrooms to do the job. Though adequate funding will solve the problems in our schools, it is necessary to provide every child the opportunity for a quality education.

The unfortunate truth is that many of our political leaders have chosen to ignore our business community and have failed to invest in our public schools. It's time for our political leaders to listen to the experts and our business and civic leaders across the state. It is time to begin to move toward fully funding MAEP.