(MAEP) on State Assigned School Accreditation Levels

State funding mechanisms are subject to intense political and economic scrutiny. The question asked most often tends to be, is the public getting sufficient return on their investment? Accountability standards arising from the No Child left Behind Act (NCLB) have sharpened the focus of this question to whether the students and schools are meeting established benchmarks. A study of the impact of funding levels in the Mississippi state funding mechanism [Mississippi Adequate Education Program (MAEP)] attempted to determine whether recent increases in these funding levels impacted the state accreditation (based on student performance) of the schools in Mississippi. Results show that while the number of lower achieving schools has been greatly reduced, funding level is inversely related to accreditation level. Low performing schools require greater levels of funding to redress academic deficits and move to higher levels of accreditation while higher performing school require comparatively less funding to achieve and/or maintain a higher level of accreditation