MLC Education & Workforce Committee News

2026 Quarter 2 | The Council of State Governments (CSG) | Midwestern Legislative Conference (MLC)

MLC Education & Workforce

Committee Newsletter

Co-Chair

NE Sen. Jana Hughes

Co-Chair

MN Rep. Bernie Perryman

Vice Chair

KS Rep. Mari-Lynn Poskin

Committee Happenings

Hello again members of The Council of State Governments' Midwestern Legislative Conference Education & Workforce Committee. The summer season is essentially here and our committee has two big upcoming events that we hope you can attend.

June 12 Webinar on State K-12 Education Funding Formulas

In cooperation with the MLC Fiscal Affairs Forum, our committee will be hosting a policy webinar that provides a large-scale look at the different ways states in the region fund K-12 public schools. The webinar will also highlight on-the-ground insights on some of the recent conversations being held in legislative-created commissions that are tasked with reforming state funding formulas.

Among the presenters for this hour-long event will be Michael Griffith, a nationally recognized expert and consultant in school finance and a senior research fellow at the Learning Policy Institute.

The event is open to all, so please share this invite with your fellow legislative colleagues and staff.

Be sure to join us on Friday, June 12, starting at 3 p.m. EDT/2 p.m. CDT.

MLC Annual Meeting on Aug. 30-Sept. 2 in Saint Paul, Minn.

Registration is open for the 80th Annual Meeting of the Midwestern Legislative Conference. The regular registration deadline is July 24, and an early-bird discount is available now through June 30.

The MLC Annual Meeting is a four-day, family-friendly conference that gives attendees a chance to interact with legislators and policymakers from across the Midwestern region — including your fellow Education & Workforce Committee members.

On Sunday, Aug. 30, our committee will hold its annual in-person meeting. In addition to allotting time for members to participate in a roundtable discussion, this meeting will feature a presentation on state efforts to increase postsecondary degree and credential attainment among working adults, and highlight some of the economic barriers that complicate this goal.

The Annual Meeting will also feature other education- and workforce-related content, including a keynote address by Khan Academy CEO and founder Sal Khan, who will present on the increasing integration of AI in educational instruction, as well as a plenary session on recent innovations in literacy education.

For more information about the 2026 MLC Annual Meeting, please visit HERE.

Education & Workforce Articles

Not every job requires a college education. Nonetheless, some researchers are speculating that in a few years, an even greater portion of job openings will, at a minimum, require applicants to have obtained a four-year degree. The Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce, for example, projects that by the year 2031, 42 percent of all U.S. jobs will require a bachelor’s degree or higher (compared to 29 percent that will require only an associate’s degree or some college).

In order to accommodate this growing demand in a manner that is both timely and accessible for a larger group of people, some policymakers believe administration of certain high-demand baccalaureate programs should be extended to community colleges — institutions that are more widely available geographically and accustomed to serving the needs of nontraditional students.

An article in the latest edition of Stateline Midwest explores the various logistical hurdles community college baccalaureate programs must address in order to be successful and not be duplicative of existing offerings.

The article can be found HERE.

Research Resources

CSG Issue Brief: "The 123s of ABCs: Building and Financing Foundations for Pre-K in the South"

Our colleagues at CSG South have also been exploring differences in states' educational funding methods. Earlier this spring, the office published an education-related issue brief that examines how states in the Southern region fund pre-k schools through unique mixtures of federal and state dollars.

The report categorizes the levels of allotment these states receive from programs like Head Start and the Child Care and Development Block Grant; describes active and ongoing state-level efforts to fund universal pre-k; and examines recent legislative proposals to expand related funding through, for example, new revenue-sharing plans and funding formula changes.

The report can be found on the CSG South website HERE.

Thank you for reading. Watch for the next edition to come out in

September 2026.