Mississippi lawmakers will be asked to consider a bill to expand the state’s college financial aid programs for the second session in a row.  This year’s proposal is the same as last’s: To double the amount of money some students receive through the Mississippi Resident Tuition Assistance Grant and open up the program to adult and part-time college students, many of whom have never before been eligible for aid.  An estimated 38,000 new students would benefit from these changes, collectively called MTAG Works.  But that comes with a $31 million price tag, an increase by more than half what Mississippi already spends on its state financial aid programs. Proponents, including the Mississippi Economic Council, will have to convince lawmakers that financial aid expansion is a good use of state dollars.  “The Legislature has to understand the value of this appropriation,” said Scott Waller, the president of the Mississippi Economic Council. “That’s still going to be our hardest hill to climb, if you will.” Last year’s bill stalled in the House of Representatives due to the price tag, and lawmakers in both chambers questioned if the increased spending would result in a return on investment to state taxpayers.  This year, a taskforce behind the legislation ran an analysis to answer that very question. New students who receive MTAG Works are projected to graduate at a rate of 63% compared to the state’s current graduation rate of 49%, according to an analysis conducted by UnlockED in collaboration with Postsecondary Analytics. The study was commissioned by the Woodward Hines Education Foundation. “This is not a cost,” said Jennifer Rogers, the director of Mississippi Office of State Financial Aid who has been pushing for updates to the programs she administers since 2018. “This is an investment.”  Higher graduation rates mean there are more students with higher-paying jobs, which means the state of Mississippi would collect more income tax. UnlockED’s analysis showed MTAG Works will result in the state collecting an additional $63 million in income taxes, more than double the annual cost of the program. “If you put a dollar down and get a dollar back, that’s a pretty good investment,” Waller said. “You can’t look at it from a cost standpoint; you’ve got to look at it from a return standpoint.” The return on investment would likely be reduced if lawmakers cut the income tax this session. Rogers and Waller have spoken with university and community college leaders about the proposal. The Education Achievement Council, a group of state education leaders that want to increase the number of Mississippians with a college degree or credential of value to 55% by 2030, also received a preview of this year’s effort. So far, Rogers said she has heard no opposition to the bill. “I don’t think anyone has looked at this proposal and said, ‘this is not a good idea,’ because no one loses,” she said. “Every single student who is currently receiving aid will continue to do so. … Every institution receives more funds.”  The proposal will result in millions more in state funding to the universities and community colleges, according to numbers generated by Rogers’ office. But Rogers, Waller and their partners on the taskforce are also working to get support outside of the state’s higher education officials.  “We view this as not just a higher ed issue or a student issue,” Rogers said. “This is a workforce development issue as well.”  That’s why MEC is supporting the bill, Waller said. “If we’re gonna create the type of business environment that we need, it’s gonna begin with a strong workforce,” he said. Students who currently qualify for MTAG receive $500 their freshman and sophomore year, and $1,000 their junior and senior year of college. Those amounts have not increased since the grant was created in 1995 with the goal of helping middle-class families pay for college.  “But we know the cost of everything has gone up in that time,” Waller said. The MTAG Works proposal would double those amounts for low-income students and remove a provision that excludes the poorest students in Mississippi from qualifying. Though children of millionaires have received MTAG, students who qualify for a federal Pell Grant are barred from receiving the grant.  “Just by eliminating the Pell exclusion, we open it up to so many more Mississippi students,” Rogers said, citing her office’s estimate that 18,000 Pell-eligible students could benefit from MTAG with the changes.  Part-time students would also qualify for MTAG Works, which will largely help community college students. Rogers said she has been asked what compromises she would make if lawmakers do not fully fund the proposal. She said the entire proposal is important.  “It’s hard to find fault with any aspect of the proposal,” she said. “But it carries a cost.”  A joint legislative hearing on MTAG Works will be held on Dec. 11.  The post Efforts to expand college financial aid programs to return next session appeared first on Mississippi Today.