Mississippi’s Adequate Education Program has always seemed poorly named.

Signed into law in 1997, MAEP is one of the most argued over pieces of state law — particularly when it comes to funding matters.

MAEP’s goal was to equally distribute state education money to districts across the state. The law aims to do that through a rather complicated formula for divvying out state dollars.

On paper, MAEP seemed to set a minimum floor for funding.

Unfortunately, the word “adequate” isn’t one that conjures up a sense of excellence or denotes something given a high priority.

In fact, quite the opposite is true. Replacing the word with the phrase “good enough” fits in most cases.

But the real kicker about Mississippi’s “Good Enough” Education Program is that it’s a bit of a sham. First, Mississippi is an educationally deficient state. We should not focus on being adequate, but instead aim for excellence.

Beyond that obvious linguistic lob is a much more disturbing trend. In the last 17 years, the state has only adequately funded the MAEP twice.

That’s just not adequate or good enough. Our children deserve better.

A group calling themselves Better Schools, Better Jobs is aiming to collect enough signatures to put the funding of MAEP on the November 2015 ballot. We wish them success in their endeavors.

If the lawmakers cannot muster the common sense to realize education must be Mississippi’s first priority, then perhaps the voters will.