The COVID-19 pandemic plunged education communities into an emergency mode of operation and challenged the pedagogic core of education. Schools across America suddenly lost access to everything essential to their daily educational practices, including face-to-face interactions with students. School administrators scrambled to devise remote…

The purpose of this article is to examine a 'grow your own' model of leadership preparation and placement of educational administrators in the state of Tennessee. The growing need for school and district administrators in the rural counties of Tennessee mirrors a nationwide issue, and state policymakers and practitioners must respond appropriately…

With more than two decades of on-the-ground experience impacting 300,000 educators and 3 million students, NIET's success is grounded in research. The success of NIET's work is evident in the positive findings from evaluations of impact. In NIET's 2022-23 Research Summary, we summarize findings from five new studies and highlight selected findings…

While school closures resulting from the pandemic in spring 2020 created challenges for every school district, districts serving predominantly rural communities faced even greater obstacles. Lack of access to broadband internet connectivity in rural and remote areas complicated many students' efforts to participate in remote learning. In addition,…

Since 2012, the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation has supported educational enrichment in rural areas by awarding over $3.3 million in grants to six outstanding organizations operating in Iowa, Indiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia. In this report, the authors combine the experiences of these organizations with findings from the…

This article describes how out-of-work miners are engaged in the Empowering Education Initiative, a unique alliance between Country Music Television (CMT) and community colleges in Appalachia. The initiative, which includes a website and a series of country music concerts, is changing the conversation in the Appalachian region, giving hope to…

Researchers at NIET [National Institute for Excellence in Teaching] and elsewhere have studied the effectiveness of TAP™: The System for Teacher and Student Advancement in raising student achievement, improving the quality of instruction, and increasing the ability of high-need schools to recruit, retain and support effective teachers. This…

When the author became principal at South Pittsburg High School in the rural southeast corner of Tennessee, he noticed that the school had a serious problem with students arriving late to school in the morning and late to classes during the school day. When this issue was discussed, it was decided that there was a need to initiate a Saturday…

Imagine a K-8 school in a remote corner of southern Appalachia with a student body that once qualified for 100 percent coverage of free and reduced school meals. Imagine a school budget far below the state and national averages and a well-worn building that has been in use for a half-century. This is the reality of Grassy Fork School in Cocke…

The demand for efficiency in the schools and for the best possible use of money expended for schools and of the time of the children in school has given rise to a demand for expert supervision by men and women competent to give to all teachers, and especially to young and inexperienced teachers, help in those phases of their work in which they…

This report pays tribute to the National Science Foundation's (NSF) Rural Systemic Initiatives (RSIs), an investment of more than $140 million to improve mathematics and science education in some of rural America's most impoverished communities. The report illustrates the impact of NSF's RSI program on a national scale. Each RSI planned a project…

Although there are many sources of information about "effective schools" programs, those that specifically address the needs of rural areas are often overlooked. This document offers a collection of program descriptions to help educators determine programs and practices that appear to be effective in rural and small schools. Program…

This report is based on an almost 5-year continual study of selected collaboratives engaged in education reform and improvement with a focus on science, math, and technology in schools serving K-12 students in rural America. This version of the final report of the study is primarily intended for use by educators, decision makers, and others who…

The school/community improvement process adapted by the Rural, Small Schools Program at the Appalachia Educational Laboratory (AEL) serves to revitalize and improve rural schools, incorporating commitment of both school and community leaders to rural school improvement. This paper describes implementation of the process in four school districts,…

By focusing on a polluted river and a visit to a rural Tennessee town, sixth-grade students from suburban Asheville, North Carolina, learned more about this controversy than many of their well-informed parents and teachers. Steps for creating similar interdisciplinary thematic units are described, along with the benefits of team teaching and…