This booklet describes the Country Area Program (CAP), a commonwealth-funded program targeted at alleviating educational isolation among government and nongovernment rural schools in New South Wales, Australia. This booklet is intended to help parents better understand the setting in which the CAP operates. The aims of the program include…

This document is a guide for small school districts that are interested in using a nongraded arrangement at the elementary school level. Nongrading recognizes that children learn at different rates and in different ways and allows them to progress as individuals rather than classes. A 4-year phase-in approach eases implementation of the nongraded…

This training guide provides guidelines and sample strategies for using the 1989 publication, "The Multigrade Resource Handbook," in a variety of professional settings ranging from teacher training programs to school and district inservice. This guide has been developed primarily for preservice teacher educators working with prospective…

Intended for the staffs of museums, zoos, and other science related centers, this manual is a step by step guide to establishing a rural science outreach and education program. Based on the experiences of the New Mexico Rural Science Education Project (NMRSEP), this manual focuses on rural elementary schools and on earth and life sciences. Much of…

This guide is intended to help districts and schools think about how their programs for educationally deprived children are designed and how they can be improved. In view of new Chapter 1 legislation (P.L. 100-297), which places strong emphasis on program improvement to disadvantaged students, practitioners need to internalize elements of new…

Following inquiry into small elementary school evaluation processes, a system of evaluation was developed which proposes to standardize and make more efficient already existing forms of evaluation, improve communication among school staff on matters of education and evaluation, and insure that all critical matters of schooling are openly reviewed…

Comprehensive staff development approaches described in this paper are based on on-site work with school districts and a 1980 National Rural Project investigation of problems experienced by over 80 rural districts and cooperatives across the country as they attempted to implement staff development programs. Three models are described which…

A major goal of the National Rural Project's (NRP) Management Information System (MIS) is to aid the parents and educators of rural handicapped students in delivering quality educational services and fully implementing the Education for All Handicapped Children Act, PL 94-142. MIS tailors reports to the specific needs of three target audiences…

Volume II of a 3-volume report demonstrates the use of Design Determinants and Options (presented in Volume I) in the planning and design of small rural Alaskan secondary schools. Section I, a checklist for gathering site-specific information to be used as a data base for facility design, is organized in the same format as Volume I, which can be…

The second annual Rural Technology Institute (RTI) was a 3-day training event designed to help rural educators increase their school's or district's capacity to use technology for learning. Three strands focused on technology issues within the areas of administration, curriculum, or infrastructure support. Participating schools or districts were…

Presents 10 guidelines for seeking legislative support and funding for new educational technology in small rural schools. Summarizes suggestions obtained in legislator interviews concerning effective proposals and presentations to legislators. (SV)

West Virginia has been pursuing an approach to connecting students to the information highway that mirrors the model envisioned by the Telecommunications Act of 1996. This policy brief aims to help schools and state agencies understand the discounts provided by the Act. U.S. Senator Jay Rockefeller explains the provisions of the…

The participant material masters from 14 modules in the "Facilitator's Guide to Staff Training for the Rural America Series" have been compiled in this document, to facilitate duplication. Items of interest may be duplicated in quantity by a variety of methods requiring a minimum of time, effort, and expense. All pages have been…

An effective way to help develop a strong rural educational program is to establish a business partnership between the rural school and the business community. Once a relationship is set up, the advantages for both the schools and business community could prove beneficial to the entire rural community. By cooperating with the rural schools in…

Written to shed light on the unique recruitment and retention problems faced by rural and small school districts, this booklet also presents strategies to address these problems. Among problems noted in the opening overview are that recruiting and retaining good teachers in rural and small schools is complicated by inadequate pay which does not…