Last month, the U.S. Department of Education (ED) hosted its first rural education Twitter chat. The hashtag #EDRuralChat allowed Twitter users to pose questions to John White, Deputy Assistance Secretary for Rural Outreach. The chat lasted 30 minutes, during which time Deputy White responded to four questions.  We posed several questions and though none of the responses were specific to high school, Deputy White did respond to one set of…

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The U.S. Department of Education (ED) unveiled a new Rural Education Resource Center Web site that provides helpful information targeted to rural schools, including rural teacher insights, pertinent news, programs, events, rural resources, and funding opportunities.  Users can also read a recent blog post from U.S. Secretary of Agriculture and Chair of the White House Rural Council, Tom Vilsack, who highlights a report about the ongoing focus on…

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The American Youth Policy Forum (AYPF) recently hosted a webinar featuring two Southwestern high schools that are successfully overcoming common challenges facing rural school, such isolation, limited access to qualified teachers, and low college enrollment among their students. Patton Springs School (Afton, TX) and Loving High School (Loving, NM) were featured because of their success graduating students and preparing them for college. 

Patton Springs School has 100…

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Could high school dropout indicators tested in urban areas also predict high school dropouts in my rural state of Idaho? We all realize schools large and small, rural and urban, need student data tracking systems. The Early Warning System (EWS) Tool v2.0, available from the National High School Center, is a free, downloadable Excel-based tool that uses readily available student-level data to identify students who exhibit early warning signs…

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Increasing learning time is one of the requirements of both the transformation and turnaround models of the School Improvement Grant (SIG) and districts propose fulfilling this requirement in myriad ways. About half of high schools receiving SIG funds are adding minutes to the school day and/or adding days to the school calendar—by design, increasing learning time for all students. Nearly three-quarters of high schools provide before or after school…

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Our last post on Rural Schools and the Challenge of Teacher Recruitment described some unique challenges faced by rural high schools.  States and districts have been working on solutions to these challenges.  The comprehensive center network will be exploring the challenges and solutions this winter and spring; here is a sampling of some of the strategies underway. 

1. Incentives

Some states have been providing financial incentives such as signing…

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In our last blog posts, Rural High Schools: Unique Contexts and Rural High Schools: Complex Challenges, we outlined some of the unique aspects of rural education in the United States.  This post focuses on the challenges of recruiting and retaining teachers in rural schools; the final in this series will offer some promising strategies to those challenges.

While rural communities have many positive qualities and have attracted…

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