As a Family and Consumer Science educator at Union City High School in Union City, Pennsylvania, I have heard and seen a great deal. I have been teaching for 24 years at this rural Pennsylvania Middle/High School where teen pregnancy has always been a problem. Teaching students abstinence as the only method of birth control has been a major…

Fritz Detwiler's article (in the December 1993/January 1994 "Educational Leadership" issue) implies that had Blissfield (Pennsylvania) Community Schools followed a democratic process, the district's Communities for Developing Minds project would have been adopted. Fundamentalist pressures prevailed despite Blissfield's democratic…

Since the authors' previous article was submitted, the Reading First proposal in question was funded without revisions. This may have happened because a new governor and political party had replaced those in charge of the Reading First program. Three implications arise: persist when values collide; who controls state government matters; and…

Pennsylvania is the third most rural state in the nation. The recession of the 1980s devastated the rural economy, leading to a brain drain from rural areas. Nevertheless, there's much that's right about rural schools. Rural schools have pioneered the use of distance education technology. Staff remain in rural schools because they like the…

In spite of 1983 legislation intended to equalize financial differences among school districts, Pennsylvania continues to experience inequalities in school funding. A study of Pennsylvania school finance over a 10-year period, 1984-85 through 1993-94, examined differences in spending among the 25 lowest spending districts (Lo-25) and the 25…

Case study of a poor, rural Pennsylvania school district's experience with the Reading First initiative illustrates how the No Child Left Behind Act confines districts to a few federally prescribed, "scientifically proven" curricula that ignore local conditions. Sanctioned schools are negatively labeled but receive inadequate funding,…