There may never be a shortage of ideas or interest in how to improve education in Mississippi.
This past legislative session, state lawmakers focused their intention on several proposals that fall under the umbrella called “school choice.” There were proposals to make it easier for students to jump across public school district lines; to subsidize families that send their children to private schools; to create charter schools in more places. None of these ideas got through the legislative process, though, because of disagreement within the ruling Republican Party over whether these initiatives would do more harm than good.
There is, though, an education reform that has widespread agreement as to its value: preschool education.
Although Mississippi was late to the idea of investing public dollars in getting children started in school before they turn 5 years old, it has been steadily catching up both in terms of quality and quantity.
Last month, a report by the National Institute for Early Education Research again gave Mississippi high marks for the quality of its publicly funded preschool programs. It was one of only six states to meet all 10 of the institute’s standards, covering areas from class size to teacher qualifications.
The report also showed that Mississippi’s state-funded pre-K programs are reaching more children. During the 2024-2025 school year, the state ranked 29th in enrollment, two spots higher than the year before.
That’s significant improvement for a state that until the early 1980s did not have publicly funded kindergarten for 5-year-olds, much less think about what should be offered to 4-year-olds.
With 5K education now universal, the new education frontier is to start even earlier, when the young brain is going through its most rapid rates of development. The research is clear that “quality” preschool, which stimulates a child’s brain with words and music and concepts, can help put them on a path toward academic success for the rest of their schooling.
Mississippi can be proud of the progress it has made on preschool, but it still has a long way to go. About a fourth of Mississippi 4-year-olds are in state-funded programs, and another fourth are in either federally funded Head Start or in private preschools. That leaves 45% of the state’s children depending on their families for all of their early education.
For some children that may be sufficient, provided they have at least one parent who can afford to stay home and be a full-time caregiver. But in low-income families where the parents either work or don’t have the skills to homeschool, the children end up starting kindergarten already well behind their peers.
Mississippi can do something about that. It has already demonstrated it knows how to craft a quality preschool experience. Now it’s a matter of making the financial commitment to ensure that all families, regardless of income or location, can obtain that experience for their children.
