Four Jackson-area museums are teaming up for an event lauding STEM or science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

The 2017 Mississippi Science Fest is scheduled for Sept. 22-23 in the LeFleur Museum District.

The Mississippi Agricultural & Forestry Museum, the Mississippi Children’s Museum, the Mississippi Museum of Natural Science and the Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame comprise the district.

The Alliance for Science and Technology Research in America has predicted an 11 percent increase in STEM job opportunities in Mississippi by 2024. And organizers for the event said in a news release that the goal is to spark an interest in the field among the next generation of Mississippians.

Susan Gerrard, president of the Mississippi Children’s Museum, said the goal of the event is to provide children with “examples of STEM-centered career paths they may not have had the opportunity to ever consider.”

A 2016 report by ACT, the non-profit organization that administers the ACT, called “The Condition of STEM 2016” showed that 51 percent of students that took the college and career readiness exam indicated an overall interest in STEM last year.

More:Report: STEM grads leave Mississippi, while teachers stay

Only 23 percent of the state’s high school graduates, however, met the college readiness benchmark in science. Students scored slightly better, a percentage point higher, in math. But overall the ACT found that only 10 percent of high school graduates in the state met the benchmark for STEM.

Still, there are some signs of incremental progress.

The number of students in the state taking the AP Computer Science exam more than tripled from five in 2015 to 16 in 2016.

Still, an analysis by the Georgia Tech School of Science noted Mississippi and Montana were the only two states that had no female students take the exam.

So when it comes to STEM in Mississippi, there’s room to grow.

Tickets for the festival can be purchased for $10 each. The admission gains the holder entry to all four museums on Sept. 23. A full list of the festival’s events can be found at www.mssciencefest.org.

Contact Bracey Harris at 601-961-7248 or bharris2@gannett.com. Follow her on Twitter.