CASPER - The Wyoming Heritage Foundation and Wyoming Business Alliance have announced that the 25th annual Wyoming Forum will focus on "Education: Wyoming's Choices."

The two-day sessions at Casper's Parkway Plaza Hotel and Convention Center Nov. 15-16 will feature talks by a variety of speakers.

Personalities set to address an anticipated 600-700 attendees include Peter Hutchinson, the first private sector superintendent of a public school district in Minnesota; Susan Thomas, widow of the late U.S. Sen. Craig Thomas; Michelle Sullivan of Sheridan, who chairs the Wyoming State Board of Education; and, former West Virginia Gov. Bob Wise, who currently heads the Alliance for Excellent Education in Washington, D.C.

Four forums have focused on education over the past 25 years. General topics include the Hathaway scholarship plan, Wyoming's education report card, classroom issues and school reform.

In announcing the forum, the Foundation/Alliance issued some Wyoming education facts that discussed state expenditures, enrollment and graduation rates.

For instance, the average Wyoming teacher base salary is currently $50,692. There is an equivalent of 6,566 full-time employees in K-12 education. And, from 1996 to 2006, there was a 14 percent decline in K-12 enrollment, which last year stood at 98,777.

The organization's figures also report that K-12 spending in the 2005-06 school year over 10 previous years was up 73 percent at $1.15 billion. Per pupil expenditures rose by 86 percent to $12,493 between 1997-98 and 2005-06. There were 2,095 high school dropouts from the class of 2006 with a lifetime loss of $545 million in potential income had they graduated.

The report also notes that the graduation rate in Wyoming was 73 percent, 27th in the nation. Finally, the statistical summary showed the state spent $3,223 per capita in 2007-08 for K-12 and post-secondary students. This amounts to 22 percent of the total state budget, according to the Foundation/Alliance figures.