Mississippi Round UP

The Associated Press,

Officer awarded by NRA for fatal shooting sues over job loss

The National Rifle Association’s 2012 national Law Enforcement Officer of the Year has accused his former police department of forcing him to resign.

The Clarion Ledger reports David McCarley filed a federal lawsuit Monday against the police department of Pearl, Mississippi, that asks for reinstatement and full back pay.

The 51-year-old McCarley was recognized by the NRA for killing a gunman who wounded him and killed another officer.

His lawsuit says police Chief Dean Scott forced McCarley to resign Sept. 19, 2018 by telling him to resign or be fired. It doesn’t include any details about the circumstances.

The lawsuit says McCarley wasn’t given a reason for the demand nor was he given required due process hearings.

Police spokesman Lt. John Chalk says the department can’t comment.

Hood calls for preschool, teacher pay, higher K-12 spending

Democratic gubernatorial nominee Jim Hood Tuesday detailed an ambitious education program which, if fully implemented, would bring the biggest increase in Mississippi education spending in more than a decade.

Hood, Mississippi’s attorney general, told reporters after appearing at a school in Greenville that he wants to expand Mississippi’s small state-funded preschool program, make a big boost in teacher salaries and pay the full tab called for by Mississippi’s education funding formula.

Hood also said he wants to expand subsidies for aspiring teachers and make it easier to qualify academically to become a teacher. He says those measures are needed to combat a shortage of educators in Mississippi.

The Republican nominee, Lt. Gov. Tate Reeves, has said that Hood’s plans on education and other topics are unrealistically expensive without tax increases. Hood’s proposals would amount to something more than $500 million a year in increased spending, once fully enacted over several years.

The state’s funding formula, called the Mississippi Adequate Education Program, has long been a source of political contention. Democrats and many public school supporters say schools need more money, while Republicans fear money is wasted on administration. Republican leaders haven’t tried in recent years to hit the funding target required under the law and unsuccessfully sought a major overhaul of the formula after voters rejected a state constitutional amendment that would have enshrined a funding mandate in Mississippi’s fundamental governing document.

Full funding would require $2.55 billion next year, according to preliminary estimates submitted this summer. That’s an increase of more than $330 million over what the state is spending this year.

“A lot of Delta schools here have been cheated by the Legislature on proper funding,” Hood told reporters.

Hood also called for a $3,000 boost in teacher pay over two years, saying the $1,500 provided by lawmakers this year is insufficient. Using numbers from this year, that would cost more than $150 million. Hood would go farther than that, realigning yearly increases for experience so educators would get a 2% boost for each year they teach up to 25, and then a 5% yearly boost for years 26 through 35. The Hood campaign didn’t immediately provide an estimate of how much the higher yearly increases would cost.

Hood also proposes spending about $45 million more over four years to expand state-funded pre-kindergarten classes for 4-year-olds. He says increasing funding to Mississippi’s early learning collaboratives, public-private partnerships that provide the classes, would help 23,000 children not served by Head Start, private or some other pre-K.

During the Republican primary, Reeves proposed a workforce development plan that included calls to expand computer science education and do more to let students earn college credits while in high school. Reeves’ biggest proposed education item would be a $75 million infusion into community colleges to modernize worker training efforts.

Reeves has said he supports increasing teacher pay but hasn’t said by how much.

“Jim Hood and Tate Reeves agree that we need to keep raising teacher pay and allow alternative certification so that we can get additional talented people into the classroom,” Reeves spokesman Parker Briden said in a statement. “The difference between Hood and Tate on education is that Hood’s plan does not focus on student performance at all while Tate Reeves will keep reforming our system to ensure our kids are learning.”

Letter grades rise for Mississippi public schools

Mississippi’s public school districts and schools showed broad improvement under the state’s letter grading system in 2018-2019.

The number of A-rated districts rose from 18 to 31 in data published Tuesday, while the number of districts earning a C, D or F rating fell. The state Board of Education still must give final approval to the ratings in a meeting scheduled for Thursday.

“Our accountability system is working,” state Superintendent Carey Wright told reporters. “It also shows you how well our schools are doing. Teachers and principals are doing exactly what we want them to do. They are doing an amazing job of teaching our children.”

One of the state Board of Education’s goals is for every district and school statewide to be rated C or better. This year, 70% of districts and 74% of schools were graded C or better.

The four year high school graduation rate rose to 84% from 83%, while test scores improved and more high school students enrolled in accelerated courses statewide. Those measures aided the districts’ improved ratings.

Some rural schools that teach grades K-12 or 7-12 benefited from a change in the scoring system meant to put them on level ground with four-year high schools.

Ten districts are legally eligible for a special state-controlled district for troubled schools because they scored an F for the second year in a row or the second time in three years.

That doesn’t mean any or all of them will be taken over by Mississippi’s achievement district. The state also requires that at least half of a district’s schools be rated F or at least half of all students attend F-rated schools for a district to even be considered for such a takeover.

Districts with Fs in two of the past three years and at least half their schools rated as failing include Amite County, East Tallahatchie, North Bolivar, West Bolivar and Wilkinson County

This was the first year that a measure of progress toward learning English was part of the overall score. Only districts with a certain number of students learning English were scored. Wright said grades weren’t affected for the remainder of districts, which had too few English language learners to get a score. Higher scoring districts were more likely to get scores, though. Of 31 A-rated districts, 26 had English learner scores, while only four of 19 F-rated districts did.

The best scoring school district was Petal and the worst scoring school district was Yazoo City, which is part of the state’s achievement district.

Mississippi’s second-largest school district, Jackson, improved from an F to a D, largely thanks to more than one-third of its elementary and middle schools scoring an A or a B.

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