Mississippi School Choice – The Latest

America is in the middle of a school choice revolution. As of February 2025, 29 states and the District of Columbia have at least one private school choice program, 13 of which have a program that is universally available to all K-12 students in the state. With the passage of Tennessee’s universal Education Savings Account program a few weeks ago, Mississippi is now surrounded by states that have empowered parents with school choice.

While we have made remarkable progress in K-12 education over the last decade, leading the nation in 4th grade reading improvement, we now risk falling behind. To build on our accomplishments and ensure Mississippi is competitive with our neighboring states in both education and workforce development, we need to adopt bold school choice policies with urgency.

There are currently six bills alive in the 2025 legislative session that would expand school choice for Mississippi families. Four of those bills now face a critical February 13 deadline to pass out of the House of Representatives. Those bills are:

• House Bill 1432 –  sponsored by Rep. Rob Roberson, would make several changes to Mississippi’s charter school law to expand the landscape where charters can be created in the state and foster a healthy charter sector.
• House Bill 1433 – sponsored by Rep. Rob Roberson, would allow a student who has been enrolled in a school or district rated D or F within the past five years to use state funds to attend another public or private school. The bill also establishes a new scholarship program for foster children, which may be used for tuition, tutoring, educational therapies, and more.
• House Bill 1434 – sponsored by Rep. Rob Roberson, would establish specialized academic programs for high school students in grades 9-12, focusing on high-demand fields such as aeronautics, geospatial studies, engineering, nursing, and technical skills for high-demand jobs that require certification or other credentials. Modeled after the state’s highly touted specialized academic schools, including the Mississippi School for Math and Science on the campus of MUW and the Mississippi School for the Arts in Brookhaven, the bill focuses on improving workforce readiness and postsecondary educational outcomes for low-income students residing near Delta State University, Mississippi Valley State University and Alcorn State University.
• House Bill 1617 – sponsored by Rep. Rob Roberson, would allow homeschool students to participate in public school extracurricular activities, including sports.

Two bills have already passed the House of Representatives and are headed to the Senate for consideration:

• House Bill 1435 – sponsored by Rep. Jansen Owen, would allow students to transfer to public schools outside of their residentially assigned school district without having to get approval from the student’s home district. Approval would still have to be granted by the district to which the student wants to move (the receiving district).
• House Bill 1078 – sponsored by House Speaker Jason White, removes the requirement that families be accepted into a private school before they can qualify for the state’s Education Scholarship Account program for students with special needs. The implementation of this mandate in 2024 resulted in approximately 150 students being kicked off the ESA waitlist.

Many of these bills represent incremental (but necessary) measures to bring school choice to more Mississippi families. We are grateful to House Speaker Jason White, House Education Chairman Rob Roberson, and the House Education Committee for their leadership on this important issue, and we hope the entire House of Representatives will join in support of families, parents, and students by voting for these bills.