The new normal: How Mississippi students are adjusting to a virtual school year

By Aallyah Wright | Oct. 14, 2020

CLARKSDALE — On an early August morning, Clarksdale Collegiate Public Charter School teacher Hannah Fisher looked directly into her computer camera and asked her first graders to hold up their pencils. Every student who raised their pencil finished their assignment: spelling two and four letter words.

In a normal setting, Fisher would be in her classroom teaching students. Now, as a global pandemic has upended schooling and the way people teach, she’s fixated on students in small squares on Zoom. Some students were visible on their screens. A few others only displayed their names. 

A few minutes later, Fisher reminded students to move on to write their words. In the midst of that, she stopped to address a student’s behavior.

“Sit up,” she said to the student. “Remember we’re not (lying) on the carpet. We’re writing right now. …I’m going to turn off your video and it’ll come on in 30 seconds. OK? I’m gonna get you to fix it in that time.”

Fisher’s first graders are not alone in struggling to stay engaged, communicate and navigate online platforms. Additionally, connectivity and internet access is a hindrance to getting kids online. The Mississippi Department of Education is currently rolling out a plan to deliver nearly 400,000 devices to students. Districts are supposed to receive them no later than Nov. 20. The department said 12 districts are receiving their devices this week, though many are still waiting. 

Students and parents say they fear the negative impact the delay will have on student learning.

READ MORE: Mississippi is getting devices to every child. That’s just the first step.

“(Schools) want to make sure that kids are safe, accounted for, (and) engaged in their learning,” said Brennan Parton, policy and advocacy director at Data Quality Campaign. “They’re really having to rethink and reimagine and get creative about how we do that during this unprecedented time … the stakes are higher.”

Nearly three months ago, the state department required local school districts to submit their reopening plans detailing how they will resume — whether virtual, in-person or a mixture of the two. 

The Clarksdale Municipal School District settled on virtual learning for the first half of the semester. This changed when school officials learned many students did not have internet access or devices. So for the first two weeks of school, students received instructional packets. Currently, 21% of the student population uses instructional packets only and 57% is virtual only, according to data from the Clarksdale Municipal district.

Students said the instructional packets cause confusion and leave them unmotivated because they don’t provide the opportunity for teacher-student interaction the way a traditional classroom set up does. 

“I’ve never taken human anatomy so I don’t know what I’m doing, meaning more than likely if I don’t find the answers online, I will fail doing the packets,” Marchellos Scott, Jr., a Clarksdale High School senior, said. “The teachers said they’re just holding on, doing what they’re being told and everything keeps changing so they are confused as well.”

Scott is enrolled in virtual only but is required to complete instructional packets for certain classes, he said. He said he thinks his grades will suffer because he is not learning as much.

For other students, online learning halts much needed support services.

Griffin Threatt, an eighth grader at Clinton Junior High School, said he missed the face-to-face interaction with his teachers. Griffin is on a hybrid schedule, but a traditional classroom environment keeps him “more focused while I’m learning,” he said.

His mother, Amanda Threatt, praised his growth over the past year, but worries he won’t be able to keep up. She added he hasn’t received as much support as a student with special needs.

“I went ahead and got him a math tutor because he’s in Algebra this year just to keep him on task,” she said. “(One of his teachers) said it’s really hard to help the kids with IEPs (Individualized Education Plans) because we really don’t have the support right now… He feels like he’s learning but not at the rate he’s used to.”

Some parents said virtual learning created opportunities to spend quality time they wouldn’t have otherwise.

Before the pandemic, Jackson native Brittany Watson Cain worked eight-hour days. She arrived at home around 10:00 p.m. every night, so she rarely saw her four children. When schools closed in March, so did the doors at her job. She started working from home.

“By the time you get home, you’re exhausted, they’re tired, so it wasn’t always the best scenario,” Watson Cain said. “It’s harder for some people because they don’t have that. They really don’t have childcare, you know? So I do understand.”

District officials said technology allows students to explore and use applications on their own even though it poses some challenges. Clarksdale Collegiate students had devices before the pandemic, but now students have devices at home. This means students don’t have in-person teacher support to assist with devices. Despite this, students are still able to navigate programs — like first graders submitting Google Forms, said Amanda Johnson, executive director of Clarksdale Collegiate.

“We’ve been pushed to think about how we use technology and just teaching our kids and getting them engaged,” Johnson said. “It’s allowing technology to help us solve problems and help us support our kids more. There’s no reason why that should go away.” 

Parton, the Data Quality Campgain director, says state education agencies and lawmakers should be forward-thinking about understanding how the pandemic has disrupted students’ learning progress. This magnifies learning inequities even more for students who need more support and resources. 

“Even as they’re trying to meet students’ acute needs — internet access, laptops, engagement in class — states also need to be planful about the kinds of things that they’re going to need to do not only now, but the rest of the school year,” Parton said. “There’s going to be a lot of academic slide for students – more than you normally lose over the course of the summer.”

Carey Wright, state superintendent of Mississippi public schools, encourages teachers to accelerate learning as a way to address learning loss, or academic slide. For example, if a student is in fifth grade, the teacher should teach fifth grade standards.

“Our standards are designed in a way that they build on each other and also spiral,” she told Mississippi Today. “If you keep drilling and killing on some of these skills, kids are never going to get it. Start with grade-level standards and accelerate their learning. That approach is one that has been validated by others in the field.”

Remote learning is a learning curve for educators and families, but consistent communication and proper resources can alleviate concerns and access barriers for students.

“Until everyone gets on the same page, it’s only going to get worse,” Scott, the Clarksdale student, said. “It’s definitely gonna be hard on students, but I think we should still put together plans in case something like this happens again.”

The post How Mississippi students are adjusting to a virtual school year appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today

Othia McMillian fills out her ballot at the Hinds County Courthouse on Oct. 13, 2020.

While Mississippi’s early voting laws are the most restrictive in the nation this year, it appears those eligible to vote absentee in the 2020 election may be doing so in record numbers.

As of Sunday, more than three weeks before Election Day and the deadline to vote absentee, 58,796 Mississippians had cast absentee ballots, according to the secretary of state’s office, and 91,474 absentee ballots had been requested. In the 2016 presidential election, a total of 102,915 Mississippians voted absentee.

Circuit clerks in several highly populated counties told Mississippi Today that absentee voting appeared higher than ever in 2020, a year featuring a presidential election and the closely contested U.S. Senate race between Republican Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith and Democrat Mike Espy. 

Typically, high absentee voting numbers portend high in-person voter turnout on election day.

“It’s extremely heavy,” Harrison County Circuit Clerk Connie Ladner said of early voters in the most populous county on the Gulf Coast. “We started on Sept. 21 with a line of people, and it hasn’t stopped since. I’ve been through a lot of presidential elections, and I’ve never seen an absentee turnout like this.”

Ladner said that as of Tuesday, her county had received 8,398 absentee votes, compared to 5,379 total for the 45-day absentee voting period in the 2016 presidential election.

Voters have also stood in long lines outside the circuit clerk’s office in Hinds County, the most populous county in the state and a Democratic stronghold.

Hinds County Circuit Clerk Zach Wallace told Mississippi Today about 5,000 residents there had already voted absentee. In the 2016 presidential election, Hinds County received 5,309 absentee votes.

Early voting has been among the hottest political issues of 2020 as many voters express safety concerns during the COVID-19 pandemic. Mississippi is the only state in the nation that doesn’t provide all registered voters a way to vote early without having to risk COVID-19 exposure at the polls, according to a report by the Democracy Initiative.

READ MORE: “Practices aimed to suppress the vote”: Mississippi is the only state without early voting for all during pandemic.

To make accommodations for the pandemic, Mississippi lawmakers expanded early voting earlier this year only to those who are in a physician-ordered quarantine or are the caretaker for someone in quarantine. Lawsuits have been filed to try to expand the early voting opportunities in Mississippi, but they have had not been successful thus far.

Even before the pandemic, Mississippi had some of the most restrictive early voting laws in the nation. Only people who are going to be away from their home area on Election Day, those over the age of 65 and people with disabilities are allowed to vote absentee, either in person or by mail.

Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today

“We’re getting our votes in early and getting it done,” said Irish Simmons, with her brother Tyrone Mayes, at the Hinds County Courthouse on Oct. 13, 2020.

State law, however, does not mandate that people wanting to vote early because they are going to be away from their home on Election Day provide proof of their travel plans.

“I tell them if they have an ID, they can vote,” said Union County Circuit Clerk Phyllis Stanford.

“We tell them they have to comply for absentee voting with a valid reason,” said Ladner, the Harrison County circuit clerk. “We refer them to the county website, where we list the reasons, and they call us back and tell us their reason.”

Ladner said voters are basically on the honor system for supplying a reason, but “they’re signing the application under penalty of perjury.”

State law does prevent circuit clerks from sending a mail-in ballot to someone because they say they will be away from home on Election Day. Typically, the circuit clerk would tell that person to drop by their office before Election Day and vote.

Mail-in ballots are reserved for people who are residents and registered voters of the state who are in college away from home, might be working or living for whatever reason for a period of time out of state. In that situation, both the ballot and the ballot application would have to be notarized. 

People with a temporary or permanent disability and their caretakers in some instances can receive a mail-in ballot. People over age 65 can also request a mail-in ballot or vote early in person. There are other, smaller categories of early voters, such as people whose jobs would prevent them from voting on Election Day, and U.S. House and Senate members and their staffs.

READ MORE: Legislative leaders, once again, say they will not expand early voting during pandemic.

Ladner said she believes interest in the election, more than the COVID-19 pandemic, is driving the absentee turnout this year.

“I think some may have to do with (the pandemic), but I just think it’s this election, from what we’ve seen and listening to the people coming in,” Ladner said. “We have people who it’s their first time to vote, coming in to vote absentee … With the over 65 crowd, yes, that would be because of COVID-19, but we have a lot of students, lot of people that work out of town, and a great turnout from military.”

Ladner said that of the 8,398 Harrison County absentee ballots so far, 5,749 have been cast in person, and the rest are mail-in. She said her office is sending out about 200-300 mail in ballots a day. Mail in ballots must be postmarked by election day on Nov. 3 to be counted.

Ladner said that recently, a man came in and voted absentee on his 102nd birthday.

In Union County in Northeast Mississippi, 484 people had voted absentee as of Tuesday compared to about 500 for the entire early voting period in 2016.

Sparsely populated Quitman County in the Mississippi Delta may be one of the few counties not experiencing a rush of early voters.

“Compared to other (presidential election years), it’s been a crawl,” Quitman County Circuit Clerk Brenda A. Wiggs said. “We have less than 200 right now – probably around 175 – and we usually get around 900.

“They were telling us to expect more than ever this year – we were figuring around 1,300, but there’s no way we’ll do that at this pace,” Wiggs continued. “I have no idea as to why, other than there aren’t any local elections, and you don’t have the ballot shoppers going around or calling people.”

Wiggs said she’s not aware that the COVID-19 pandemic is having any impact on absentee voting, but noted, “a lot of the people that normally come in (and absentee vote) are not coming in yet.”

Wiggs said most absentee voters do so in person at the clerk’s office because of the difficulty of getting a mail-in ballot notarized.

Wiggs said she provides absentee ballots to anyone who “has a legitimate, lawful reason,” although she said it’s hard to verify whether a reason is true.

“Of course, they can lie to me – believe me, they lie like a dog all the time — but we’ve not had many come in that I questioned at all. Ones that have come in have had legitimate reasons.”

Wiggs said one man requested a ballot because of COVID-19, and she told him that was not a valid excuse unless a doctor had diagnosed him with it. But she said the man was over 65, “so he had a legitimate reason anyway.”

The post Mississippi poised to break absentee voting record in 2020 election appeared first on Mississippi Today.

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Gov. Tate Reeves announced two new appointments to the State Board of Education on Tuesday. 

Reeves is appointing Angela Bass, the executive director of an education organization, of Jackson and Glen East, a superintendent, of Gulfport to fill two vacant spots on the nine-member board. 

“Mississippi’s children deserve our steadfast commitment to improving education. We must continue to improve outcomes for these students without fear of upsetting the status quo,” said Reeves in a press release. “I am confident that Angela and Glen will serve with honor and represent the interest of parents, teachers, and — most importantly — students. Their achievement has to be our top priority.”

Mississippi First

Angela Bass

Bass is a former Teach for America corps member who studied education policy and management at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. She later became a teacher in both the Tunica and Desoto County school districts and an administrator at the KIPP Memphis Collegiate High School.

She currently serves as the executive director of the Mississippi Early Learning Alliance, which works with organizations and stakeholders to improve education and development of Mississippi children under 8-years-old.

“I am honored to serve the students, families, educators, and children of Mississippi. I am a leader of an early education advocacy organization, a public school parent, and a former educator,” said Bass. “I am excited to bring my perspectives to the board, all while listening to constituents and representing their interests well. I believe that our state’s future depends on the strength of our education system, and I am prepared to do the hard work to ensure its continued improvement.”

Glen East

East is superintendent of Gulfport School District, which contains 10 schools and around 5,800 students. It is an A-rated district.

He said he is looking forward to working with the board members.

“We will be working hard to do what’s best for all children in the state of Mississippi,” he said.

Jason Dean, chairman of the state board, said Bass and East’s experience and knowledge will be assets to the board. 

“Her (Bass’) impressive background in public policy, particularly as it relates to early childhood education, will be a welcome addition to the Board’s work,” said Dean. 

Dean said he has known East and describes him as “forward thinking” in his educational leadership.

“He has dedicated his professional life to improving educational outcomes and, from what I can tell, he is very much forward leaning when it comes to connecting the educational expectations of parents, students and the community,” said Dean. “We will be well served with his counsel on the State Board of Education.”

Reeves’ previous appointment to the board last came while he was lieutenant governor and was rejected by the Senate. In a controversial move, Reeves appointed former state senator Nancy Collins in his last days as lieutenant governor but waited until January after winning the gubernatorial election to announce the appointment.  

The nine-member board is appointed by state officials. The governor appoints five positions: one school administrator, one teacher, and one individual from the state’s North, Central, South Supreme Court districts, respectively. The lieutenant governor and speaker each get two at-large representatives, meaning they have no residential or occupational requirements on who to choose. The board appoints the state superintendent, who serves as the board secretary, and two student representatives who also serve on the board as non-voting members. Members serve nine-year terms. 

Bass is being appointed to the Central Supreme Court position while East will serve in the administrator role. 

There are currently several vacancies on the board, including the speaker’s at-large appointment (formerly Sean Suggs) and the lieutenant governor’s at-large appointment (formerly Collins). The teacher representative, appointed by the governor, is also vacant.

“The Lieutenant Governor continues to seek recommendations from public education stakeholders, and is in the process of considering candidates now,” said Leah Rupp Smith, deputy chief of staff for Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann.

The term of John Kelly, who fills the Southern Supreme Court District spot, expired in July, though he has continued to serve on the board. 

The post Reeves appoints two new members to State Board of Education appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Richard Williams, the 74-year-old Mississippi Sports Hall of Famer who remains the only coach ever to take a Mississippi team to the NCAA men’s Final Four, will coach again.

Williams has taken the job as special assistant to the head coach at Southern Miss, where he will work for Jay Ladner, who considers Williams a mentor.

“What an incredible addition this is for Southern Miss basketball,” Ladner said Tuesday morning, when he confirmed the hire. “Coach (Williams) is one of the best tactical basketball minds we’ve had in Mississippi or anywhere else. I couldn’t be more excited for our program. Coach’s passion is basketball and he still has a lot to offer. We just got better.”

“Coach’s duties will be multiple,” Ladner said. “He will help across the board. Obviously, he will help us from a tactical standpoint, but he will also help in analyzing what we do and in game planning for opponents.”

Rick Cleveland

Williams apparently will receive no state compensation in his new position, one that he turned down a year ago because he had committed to another year as the color analyst on the Mississippi State basketball radio network. Williams excelled in that capacity for the past six seasons.

Said Ladner, “The timing just wasn’t right last year.”

It was this time.

“I enjoyed the radio work, and you know my love for Mississippi State University,” Williams said. “I have so much respect for Neil Price (State’s radio play-by-play broadcaster) and have really enjoyed working with him and learning from him. But I just have missed really being involved with a team. I’ve missed coaching. I’m really looking forward to working with Jay again. My plan in all this is to do whatever Jay wants me to do.”

Williams said he already has observed three Southern Miss practices. “Jay’s got a lot of new players,” he said. “What I was most impressed with was how attentive those guys were to what their coaches were teaching and how hard they worked. It was fun for me, as a coach, to watch that.”

Williams said he will start his new job “at 11 a.m. Wednesday. Can’t wait.”

Ladner and Williams go way back. In 1992, Ladner was a young pharmaceutical salesman and a recent premed graduate of USM who was making good money but hating his job. He wanted to coach basketball. Jay Larry Ladner, Jay Ladner’s dad and a former coach himself, knew how hard a life many coaches live and wanted his son to stay the course. He enlisted Williams’ help.

The older Ladner set up a meeting between Williams and his son and made his intent clear. The father wanted Williams to talk his son out of coaching. Said Williams, “After about an hour of listening to Jay, I called his daddy back. I told him, ‘Coach, I got news for you. That boys of yours is going to coach basketball. Nobody is going to talk him out of it. That’s just all there is to it.’”

Eric J. Shelton, Mississippi Today/ Report for America

Jay Ladner believes Southern Miss got better with the hiring of Richard Williams.

Soon thereafter, Ladner was hired as head basketball coach at Saint Stanislaus College (actually a high school) in Bay Saint Louis. In 1998, after departing Mississippi State, Williams and his wife moved to Bay Saint Louis and Williams began to attend Ladner’s practices and games there. Pretty soon, he was on the bench as a volunteer coach.

Said Ladner, “I learned so much basketball from Coach. In my opinion, he’s as good as there is at the tactical part of basketball.”

Williams began his coaching career as a volunteer coach of a seventh grade basketball team in Natchez, where he taught math. He advanced from junior high to high school, to junior college, to college volunteer assistant coach, to college head coach, to taking the Mississippi State Bulldogs to the 1996 Final Four.

In 1986, Williams took over a struggling State program that had finished 8-22 overall and 3-15 in the SEC the year before. Four years later, State won 20 games, finished 13-5 in the SEC and won the Western Division. Six years after that, State beat No. 1-ranked Kentucky in the finals of the SEC Tournament, then upset both UConn and Cincinnati en route to the Final Four.

Since leaving State, Williams has coached in professional basketball leagues, at Pearl High School and as an assistant coach at Arkansas State, Louisiana Tech and UAB in varying capacities.

He and Ladner have remained close all along, as Ladner moved around also — from Saint Stanislaus, to Oak Grove, to Jones Junior College, to Southeastern Louisiana and now USM.

When Ladner’s Jones team won the national junior college championship in 2014, he deflected much of the credit to Williams. For his part, Ladner dedicated that championship to people he called his three mentors: his father, Williams and M.K. Turk, for whom Ladner played at Southern Miss.

Said Williams at the time Ladner was hired at Southern Miss in April of 2019: “I’ll tell you what I know about the situation. I know how badly Jay wanted that job. I know how good a coach he is, and I know Southern Miss could not have hired a coach who will be as passionate about that job as he will be. That’s his school and that’s his dream job. It’s the same as it was for me at State. Nobody is going to out-work Jay, and he’s not looking to go anywhere else.”

The obvious question: Why would Williams, at 74, return to college coaching, which has become more and more a young man’s game.

An educated guess: Williams and his wife, Diann, have no children, no grandchildren. Williams doesn’t golf. He doesn’t fish. He still eats, drinks and sleeps basketball.

Six years ago, upon his induction into the Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame, Williams told me: “I never got into coaching to make money or coach at some high level. My love is teaching basketball. That’s what I like to do.”

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Eric J. Shelton/Mississippi Today, Report For America

A voter walks into Twin Lakes Baptist Church in Madison, Miss., Tuesday, November 5, 2019.

Mississippi is the only state not to provide all citizens an option to vote early rather than go to crowded precincts on Election Day during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a report by the Democracy Initiative.

“Mississippi is now the only state in which in-person voting on Election Day is the only option available to all voters,” said the report from the Democracy Initiative, which is a coalition of 75 groups advocating for voter access. “In Mississippi, an excuse (other than risk of COVID-19) is required to cast an absentee ballot or to vote early, and not all voters qualify.”

Mississippi lawmakers did less to expand early voting or vote-by-mail opportunities during the pandemic than most states.

READ MORE: Legislative leaders, once again, say they will not expand early voting during pandemic.

The Democracy Initiative study points out that 49 states, with the exception of Mississippi, give citizens the opportunity to vote early in-person or by mail this year. Mississippi is one of just five states that does not allow no-excuse voting by mail, but in those other four states, all voters can vote early during the pandemic.

“At a time when we should all be working to make sure that the ballot is accessible to all Mississippians, we continue to fight for the rights of Mississippians to vote,” said Corey Wiggins, executive director of the Mississippi State Conference of NAACP. “Even today, in 2020, we continue to fight against old and outdated policies and practices aimed to suppress the vote.”

Even before the pandemic, Mississippi had some of the most restrictive early voting laws in the nation. Only people who are going to be away from their home area on Election Day, those over the age of 65 and people with disabilities are allowed to vote early either in person or by mail.

To make accommodations for the pandemic, the Legislature expanded early voting earlier this year to only those who are in a physician-ordered quarantine or are the caretaker for someone in quarantine. Lawsuits have been filed to try to expand the early voting opportunities in Mississippi, but thus far they have had not been successful.

The four states contiguous to Mississippi allow no-excuse, in-person early voting during this pandemic year. Arkansas is the only one of the four neighboring states to allow both no-excuse early voting in person and by mail, according to the study.

None of Mississippi’s Republican legislative leadership advocated for allowing all Mississippians to vote early this year because of safety concerns related to COVID-19. No excuse early voting also was not advocated by Gov. Tate Reeves nor Secretary of State Michael Watson, who oversees state elections.

READ MORE: Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann and Speaker Philip Gunn once supported early voting. Why did they retreat during COVID-19?

In addition, Watson has said there will be no state mask mandate at the polls on Election Day. All have said that the existing law, combined with the language giving people in quarantine the right to vote early and the personal protection equipment provided at the precincts, will ensure safe elections.

Reeves pointed out there have been special elections for state legislative seats, and to his knowledge, those have been conducted safely.

“I am fully confident on Election Day in early November that will be the case,” Reeves recently said.

More than 1 million Mississippians are expected to vote this November. The Democracy Initiative study projected that a record 160 million people may vote nationwide this year.

“The COVID-19 pandemic will make this election different than any we have ever seen,” the study said. “Due to health concerns about contracting the deadly virus while standing in or entering a crowded polling place, tens of millions of voters will vote in 2020 using a different method than they ever have before.”

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The seven-day average for new COVID-19 cases in Mississippi is now at 646, a 24% rise in the last week alone, and a 25% increase since Gov. Tate Reeves lifted the statewide mask mandate on Sept. 30.

UMMC Communications

State health officer Thomas Dobbs at a press conference at UMMC.

State Health Officer Thomas Dobbs discussed during a Monday press conference whether the mandate’s absence is directly attributable to the rise in cases.

“We started to see numbers creep up before really there would’ve been a potential impact from the mask mandate,” Dobbs said. “I will say, though, that it could certainly be part of the problem as time goes forward. Personally, I’ve been a little bit disappointed hearing from churches and businesses that they feel like they’re no longer in power to have their members or visitors wear masks, and I think that does increase risk, unfortunately.”

It’s now been 12 days since Gov. Reeves let the statewide mask mandate expire. According to the CDC,  the incubation period, or the time between someone’s infection and when they experience symptoms, is typically two weeks at the longest.

The number of new cases had steadily decreased from late July until about mid-September. During the span of the statewide mask mandate, which Gov. Reeves initiated on Aug. 4, the seven-day average for cases plummeted, dropping by 54%. The new case average is now at its highest point since Sept. 4.

In the whole month of September, the state health department never reported more than 853 cases in a day. The single-day tallies in just this past week have passed that mark three times.

Similarly, the latest report of COVID-19 in schools, compiled each week, showed the highest number of illnesses yet, with 521 cases among students, teachers and staff between Sept. 25 and Oct. 2.

Hospitalization data have also shown a drastic difference from before, during, and after the mask mandate. During the mandate, the seven-day average for total COVID-19 hospitalizations — confirmed plus suspected cases — decreased by 52%.

The average for hospitalizations, a lagging indicator, is still about where it was in late September. However, the average increased each day from Oct. 3 to Oct. 9 — the latest update available — which is by far the longest such stretch since July.

“All the indicators are looking in the wrong direction,” Dobbs said. “Hospitalizations are up, cases are up; Deaths are not really up so much, but we know that always lags. The last time we saw that was before the summer surge.”

Regionally, counties in north Mississippi and on the Gulf Coast have generally seen the highest case increases. The counties with the largest percent increases this month so far are:

• Benton County (37 new cases, 16% increase)
• Itawamba County (123 new cases, 14% increase)
• Hancock County (74 new cases, 12% increase)
• Lamar County (200 new cases, 11% increase)
• Jackson County (371 new cases, 10% increase)
• Claiborne County (48 new cases, 10% increase)
• Chickasaw County (69 new cases, 10% increase)
• George County (75 new cases, 10% increase)
• Harrison County (359 new cases, 9% increase)
• Forrest County (229 new cases, 9% increase)

The post Almost two weeks without mask mandate, COVID-19 indicators trend in “wrong direction” appeared first on Mississippi Today.

Kenny Griffis and Latrice Westbrooks are running for a Mississippi Supreme Court seat on Nov. 3.

Challenger Latrice Westbrooks says she would bring needed diversity to a Mississippi Supreme Court that has been dominated throughout its history by white men.

Incumbent Kenny Griffis said voters should consider only experience and “judicial philosophy” on Nov. 3 and not race or gender.

The two judges, both with lengthy appellate court experience, participated in an online forum hosted by the Stennis Institute of Government and the Capitol Press Corps on Monday, outlining their experience and qualifications in what is considered a very competitive race for the District 1, Place 1 high court seat for central Mississippi.

The district of about 1 million people is nearly evenly divided by race, partisanship and urban/rural population.

“Throughout Mississippi’s 200 year history, of 137 Supreme Court justices, only four have been women,” Westbrooks said. “I believe we should have a court that reflects our population.”

Only one woman currently serves on the nine-member Mississippi Supreme Court, despite women making up more than 51% of the state’s population. And Westbrooks, if elected, would be the first African American woman to serve on the state’s high court, which currently has only one Black justice.

“I believe people should vote based on qualifications, experience and judicial philosophy,” said Griffis, who describes himself as a constitutional conservative. “That’s what Dr. King fought for … Nine people deciding cases based on what the law is … Not race or gender, but who best represents the people of the state of Mississippi.”

READ MORE: The November election could put two Black justices on the Supreme Court for first time in Mississippi history.

Westbrooks, of Lexington, was elected to the Mississippi Court of Appeals in 2016. She previously served as an assistant district attorney for Harrison, Hancock and Stone counties — the first African American woman to serve there as assistant DA. Westbrooks served as prosecutor for the city of Durant and as city attorney for Isola. She served as a public defender in Holmes County for nearly 10 years and has served as legal counsel for the Jackson Police Department and as a municipal judge for the city of Lexington.

Griffis, of Ridgeland, was appointed to the Supreme Court by then-Gov. Phil Bryant to fill out the term Chief Justice Bill Waller Jr., who left the bench at the end of January 2019. Griffis was a Mississippi Court of Appeals judge from 2003 until his appointment to the Supreme Court and was serving as chief judge of the appellate court at the time of his appointment. He also previously worked as a certified public accountant.

Both candidates have decades of experience practicing law.

Although Mississippi Supreme Court races are nonpartisan, Griffis has been endorsed by the state Republican Party, and Westbrooks has the support of numerous Democratic state leaders and groups.

READ MORE: We asked Mississippi Supreme Court candidates why they’re running in the Nov. 3 election. Here’s where they stand on key issues.

Griffis said that the state’s high court, which oversees the Administrative Office of the Courts, should help update and change many court rules and procedures, including making sure judicial elections “comport with the First Amendment” when it comes to judges being allowed to express their partisan affiliation.

“I get asked all the time, are you a Republican or Democrat, and we as candidates can’t respond, and that puts us in an uncomfortable position,” Griffis said.

Griffis said he would push for updating court procedures including more public access to court data and records, more cameras and livestreaming of court proceedings statewide and to “tighten the rules” on judicial ethics, campaign contributions for judges and monitoring how lower courts are keeping up with their dockets.

Westbrooks said she brings a needed diversity of experience, working as a prosecutor, dealing with victims and law enforcement, as a public defender and on the “front lines” of the state’s justice system.

“I will bring a diversity of experience that will serve real, everyday Mississippians,” Westbrooks said.

Westbrooks said the state’s spartan and underfunded public defender system needs to be improved, and should be “on par” with the District Attorney system in terms of resources for defendants such as expert witnesses.

Westbrooks said, “We still have disparities in sentencing across the state.”

The central Mississippi district covers the counties of Bolivar, Claiborne, Copiah, Hinds, Holmes, Humphreys, Issaquena, Jefferson, Kemper, Lauderdale, Leake, Madison, Neshoba, Newton, Noxubee, Rankin, Scott, Sharkey, Sunflower, Warren, Washington, and Yazoo.

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Kristina Taylor, 18, cries as she holds a portrait of her late mother, Sharon Taylor, while she and her older sister Kristi Wishork, 25, recall the care their mother had for her children and grandchildren, Tuesday, July 21, 2020 at their home in Tucker, Miss. Taylor, 53, died of coronavirus at the University of Mississippi Medical Center in Jackson on June 26 after two weeks in the hospital. She never saw her daughter Kristina, the class valedictorian at Choctaw Central High School, graduate. (AP Photo/Rogelio V. Solis)

Leaders of the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians say they are “losing parts of our culture” as the COVID-19 pandemic has ripped through their community.

More than 10% of tribal members have contracted the virus, The New York Times reports, and they’ve made up 64% of Neshoba County’s COVID-19 deaths despite only making up 18% of the county’s population.

“We aren’t just losing family members or an aunt or uncle, we are losing parts of our culture,” Mary Harrison, interim health director for the Choctaw Health Center, told the Times. “We’ve lost dressmakers, we’ve lost artists, elders who are very fluid in our language — so when you think about an individual we’ve lost, these are important people in our community.”

Click here to read the full story from The New York Times.

After a steady decline in total cases and average cases, COVID-19 cases are again on the rise in Mississippi. The seven-day average for new COVID-19 cases is now at 646, a 27% increase since the start of October and a 24% increase in the last week alone. The average is also the highest since Sept. 4.

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