Informative new documents are available explaining the attacks on public education during the 2016 legislative session. Public education remains under attack in Mississippi and for the first time in the history of the state there exists a super conservative majority. The conservatives control the office of the Governor, Lieutenant Governor, House of Representatives and the Senate. The legislature is using its power to move an agenda to privatize public education and to further undermine and weaken a system that is already vulnerable and ranked 50th in the country. Public schools and public education is under severe attack this legislative session with bills being introduced around vouchers, scholarships, charter schools, school choice, open enrollment, virtual schools, achievement school districts, school district consolidation, literacy, school funding, Mississippi Adequate Education Program (MAEP), and Mississippi Department of Education (MDE). These bills are the direct result of premeditation and malice on the part of our conservative legislature to devalue and destroy Mississippi’s public education system, children and families. To read and learn more about these heinous bills, please see the analysis of the bills prepared by Michael Sayer, public policy consultant to Southern Echo, Inc., as well as retired co-founder of Southern Echo for over 25 years and Gregory Johnson, Executive Director of Progress MS, former employee and current secretary of Southern Echo’s Board of Directors.
