This study addressed the question, "What factors do experts perceive as impacting STEM achievement of students in rural schools with predominantly Indigenous students?" A thematic analysis of interviews with 40 educators with a depth of experience identified six major themes: holistic STEM education, inclusion of local culture in STEM…

This article explores the power of Indigenous teacher mentorship as essential to address "the change in point of view" long called for in Indigenous education. Drawing from a longitudinal, ethnographic study of an Indigenous teacher education program in a predominantly rural, high need region, we examine the basic questions: What do…

In this policy brief, the authors describe the steps they took in a rural education organization to rethink equity and justice and create meaningful and sustainable change at a policy level. The authors begin by providing context about who they are as rural educators and scholars and how their positionalities and experiences informed their…

This qualitative study examines the progress of a rural New Jersey school in addressing longstanding racial conflict after implementing a Youth Participatory Action Research project two years prior. Here we take up the thread as students continued to develop activities meant to increase awareness of ongoing issues, and as adults used professional…

This research highlights the experiences of one rural educator in a Midwestern elementary school. Initially grounded in Swanson's middle range theory of caring (1991, 1993), the author sought to make meaning of how the participant worked with immigrant students, specifically undocumented Latinx students, through an ethic of care. As tensions…

The purpose of this article is to provide an overview of the practices proposed by the contributing authors across multiple disciplines that may help to improve the educational and professional experiences of African Americans in rural spaces. The authors discuss promising practices in secondary and postsecondary education and conclude with…

Rural communities in the Southern US are shaped by a legacy of racial oppression carried out through educational systems, in tandem with contemporary policies that perpetuate the marginalization of minoritized students. In this qualitative, revelatory case study, we examine the experiences of rural, southern school leaders who are tasked with…

The understanding of identities is an important component to understanding students and their experiences in educational contexts, especially in postsecondary education. There is limited information about the identities of college students from rural areas because this student population is often neglected as a distinct group in higher education…

Currently, there is limited research that centers the voices of youth of Color and their families living and attending school in rural communities in the United States. This lack of representation is even more prominent among rural youth who identify in culturally, racially, and linguistically diverse ways and who reside and attend schools in…

This article describes the author's journey to creating the website Literacy In Place (LIP) and outlines the major components of the site. LIP was created to support the reading and writing of rural stories in an effort to help create rural community across the various (non)rural and academic spaces. The principles of the community are: (1) Rural…

This qualitative multiple case study is a follow-up to a study completed in 2007 that examined characteristics of rural school districts experiencing a high rate of superintendent turnover. The original study design incorporated extensive interviews with participants across four rural school districts; triangulating interview results with…

Service learning has been established as a promising method of teaching and learning that engages youth as change agents in their schools and communities. But service learning has not been widely implemented or studied in rural K-12 schools. This study explores the case of a service learning curriculum, the Working Together Project (WTP), in a…

School change efforts often rely on formal organizational structures to support educator knowledge of new instructional practices. Rural districts face challenges accessing the resources necessary for robust structures, but informal relationships among educators are often strong. Using structuration theory as a lens, this paper examines the…

The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed the many existing inequalities in education systems across the world. Not all children have easy access to educational online resources or digital technologies, a situation more amplified in rural contexts where access, connectivity and affordability play a significant factor. This qualitative account reveals…

This qualitative study compares the instructional leadership practices of rural and non-rural principals, seeking to understand contextually based differences in how principals create a focus on teaching and learning. Principals across settings report similarities in instructional leadership tasks; however, they reported significant contextual…