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| navigate: home: magazine: fall 2003: article | |
| Center to focus on rural education and communities By Karen Tuohey Wing | ||||||
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The image of the classic country schoolhouse in an idyllic setting has been a constant in Americans’ popular imagination. The reality is that rural education is in crisis, as much as or more so than its urban counterpart. Inadequate funding, low expectations and aspirations, geographic isolation, declining youth populations and persistent poverty are rampant problems in rural school districts and are very much in evidence in Pennsylvania, which has the third largest rural population among the 50 states, with 3.7 million rural people. To address these problems regionally and nationally, the College of Education, in collaboration with Penn State’s Children, Youth and Families Consortium and the Social Science Research Institute, is reorganizing existing resources and developing new resources for the creation of the Center on Rural Education and Communities. The planning team is comprised of co-chairs Dr. Jacqueline Stefkovich, professor and head of the Department of Education Policy Studies; Dr. William Boyd, professor of education; Dr. David Baker, associate director of the Social Science Research Institute and professor of education and sociology; Dr. Jacqueline Edmondson, assistant professor of education; and a committee from across the University and beyond. According to Baker, the center’s mission will be to: foster nationally significant interdisciplinary research and outreach activities to benefit and improve rural schools and their communities. act as a convener and bridge between rural schools and communities across the Commonwealth and the nation, helping to identify their needs and ideas for improved service delivery. serve as a clearinghouse for disseminating research and policy assessments about rural education, families and communities to local, state and federal policy makers. In May, almost 50 educators, Penn State faculty members, sociologists, government administrators and invited national experts gathered to take an active role in designing this new center. On the table for discussion was how to best establish a high-profile nationally recognized research and policy group that applies cutting-edge social science to issues of education, broadly defined, in rural communities. “This is an opportunity for Penn State to help schools address significant problems that challenge their ability to offer education to students in rural communities,” Dr. Patricia A. Nelson, associate dean for Outreach, Cooperative Extension, International Programs and Technology in the College of Education, said. “This conference brought key leaders and some synergy to help shape that agenda and have an impact nationally, as well as in the rural schools of Pennsylvania. Because of Penn State’s central location, we are well positioned to make a real contribution to rural education by addressing the significant problems inherent in the communities and serving as a model for the rural areas which exist nationwide.” The conference agenda included ample opportunities for presentations, as well as active question-and-answer sessions. Jonathan Johnson, senior policy analyst with the Center for Rural Pennsylvania, presented facts detailing the rural characteristics of Pennsylvania residents and the detrimental effects of the youth out-migration over the last 20 to 30 years. He noted that roughly half of all Pennsylvania school districts meet the definition for rural, which, according to the 2000 Census, is less than the state figure of 274 persons per square mile. The discussion on Big Issues in Rural Education was led by four nationally distinguished scholars: Hobart L. Harmon, private consultant with extensive experience in public and rural education; Paul Nachtigal, former national director of the Annenberg Rural Challenge; Paul Theobald, dean, School of Education and Counseling at Wayne State College in Wayne, Neb.; and Rachel B. Tompkins, president of the Rural School and Community Trust. The general opinion of the group was articulated by Nachtigal when he said, “Things have gotten worse rather than better over the last five years.” Nachtigal said the factors that have eroded the system include accountability and testing, an agenda that has moved away from communities to the federal level and a shift in control from local to federal. “The pendulum has swung too far,” he said. Tompkins noted Penn State’s great tradition in rural sociology and agricultural economics and President Graham Spanier’s passion for these types of issues. “I believe it’s possible to help children reach high levels of learning while building community,” Tompkins said. “The role of education in a democratic/capitalist society is very important, and we need to help rural schools and communities get better together.” Theobald elaborated on the theme that education has a profound effect on community well-being and emphasized the importance the relationship between communities and schools has on student achievement. The College of Education has a rich history of working with rural schools and communities in Pennsylvania and annually places about 900 students in early and middle rural school field experiences and 300 student teachers in rural schools. The college also serves as the host for the Pennsylvania School Study Council, a voluntary dues-paying outreach organization of 125 largely rural school districts mostly located in central Pennsylvania. According to Baker, the college has committed itself to the pursuit of holistic school improvement efforts and has identified the following areas of emphasis for the rural initiative and the new Center on Rural Education and Communities: professional development, in-service professional development, utilization of technology, family literacy initiatives and assessment and utilization of data particularly focused on the efforts to develop improved measures of student performance, multicultural understanding and the utilization of indigenous knowledge. “To make a real difference and to help the schools, we need resources, research and ingenuity,” Boyd said. “We also need a plan on how to disseminate the knowledge and reach people.” This conference opened up the dialogue which will continue as Penn State’s Center on Rural Education and Communities takes shape over the next few years. An outreach program of the College of Education, in collaboration with the Children, Youth and Families Consortium and the Social Science Research Institute | |||||
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