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…

The educational reform movement of the past several years has forced all educators to critically examine both their current and perceived roles. The following model addresses the issues of a changing clientele, a changing society, and a changing expectation of the duties of school guidance counselors. The first requirement of a new scheduling…

Describes the challenges and joys of teaching English at Oak Hill School in the remote rural community of Elmer, Louisiana. (SR)

Offers reflections on the joys and sorrows of teaching English in a rural school. (RL)

A Montana teacher in a very small high school describes how SIMMS Integrated Mathematics has helped students to develop better problem-solving skills and better oral and written communication skills, has contributed to increased student enrollment in a fourth year of high school mathematics, and has taught students to use technology tools in…

Available research supports a belief that a high-quality mathematics education for high school students cannot be accomplished unless a highly qualified mathematics teacher is in the classroom. This author primarily addresses the need for small, rural schools in Missouri to employ such highly-qualified mathematics teachers, although he also states…

Interviews with 20 high school students in rural upstate New York reveal that students perceived the rural community as offering a sense of safety and belonging while taking away personal privacy and fostering prejudices. Adult interactions perceived as important included community support for the school and adolescent activities and interpersonal…

Educators in Missouri must take offensive action promoting public education to counteract the negative press received nationwide in recent years. Communities should organize committees to address the needs of its students and address these needs with specific goals. Regional and state goals should also be made, keeping local goals in mind. St.…

Articulation between educational institutions should ideally specify exit-level competencies for student passage from one educational level to another, and thus avoid course repetition and facilitate credit acceptance. Unfortunately, this has been successfully effected in only a few instances involving a limited number of programs. Greater…

This paper contests a 1985 report by the Illinois State Board of Education, which asserted that small schools are inferior and inefficient, that student achievement is significantly related to school size, and that a high school enrollment of 500-1200 students is necessary for a broad choice of academic courses and extracurricular activities. It…

A teacher at a small, rural Georgia high school discusses how she integrated folklore with creative writing and American literature. Students discussed and wrote about family and community traditions, organized a storytelling session based on ghost tales, and conducted a workshop in folklore and storytelling for seventh-grade language arts…

During the 20th century, the involvement of communities in education has deteriorated, and the school and the community have evolved into separate worlds. This chapter describes ways in which a typical high school has increased its interactions with its own community. Those interactions have two dimensions: to bring the community into the school…

Telecommunications networks were placed in 16 rural high school library media centers in 12 southside Virginia counties. With these units, the high school media centers are able to access the online public access catalog at Longwood College, the Lancaster Library's VTLS (Virginia Tech Library System) database. If a needed book is found, a request…

This essay considers connections between rural American life, livelihood, academics, and community. Two major areas are addressed: curricular issues in rural high schools and the nature of community and its central influence on the rural school. Historically youth who stayed in their rural community did not require preparation for higher…

Describes how community members from Newburgh, New York, successfully battled against a school board proposal that called for expanding the town's high school to an enrollment of over 3,000 students. Rejects the notion that "bigger is better" and criticizes state funding formulas that create large schools by offering higher reimbursement…