RIDGELAND, Miss.- A new poll released today shows that most Mississippians want school choice. According to the poll, 78 percent of Mississippians support giving parents the right to use the tax dollars associated with their child’s education to send their child to the public or private school which best serves their needs.
The poll also found strong support for locating charter schools statewide, support for making educational scholarship accounts available to all students, and that voters are more likely to support a candidate for the legislature if they support school choice. In Mississippi, there is strong support for school choice across all ages, races, and political affiliations.
Poll Findings:
- Voters support the idea of school choice by a 78-17 margin, including 83 percent of Republicans and 73 percent of Democrats.
- When voters were asked if they would be more or less likely to support a candidate for the state legislature who supports school choice, 69 percent said more likely and 16 percent said less likely.
- Voters favor charter schools by a 57-30 margin; and 57 percent of voters think they should be available statewide compared to 18 percent who said just in failing school districts.
- Voters favor educational scholarship accounts (ESA) by a 56-34 margin; and 58 percent of voters believe they should be available to all students compared to 24 percent who said they should just be available to specific populations.
“This poll clearly shows that Mississippians, of all ages – black and white, Republican and Democrat – support school choice. But not only that, they want school choice options to be available to all students and they want their elected officials to support school choice too,” said Grant Callen, President of Empower Mississippi. “78 percent is strong support for school choice. In fact, it is hard to imagine any other political issue receiving such broad, bipartisan support. There are 115,000 Mississippi students trapped in failing districts that desperately need a way out. I hope this will be the year that the legislature makes education options available to all families.”
The statewide survey, conducted by OnMessage Inc. on behalf of Empower Mississippi Foundation, was fielded fromNovember 17 through November 19. This was a telephone survey of 800 likely voters and was stratified to reflect historic voter trends. The margin of error for the survey is +/- 3.46%.
There’s a rally Tuesday, January 26 at 9:30 AM on the steps of the Capitol, with 500 students and parents who believe in the freedom of choice for schools. More information about that rally on the event’s Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/events/489790484538906/.
