The purpose of this article is to highlight a critical approach for practice, youth participatory action research, that can be used to invite rural youth to collaborate with school administrators, educators, and community leaders to identify and examine challenges, while building upon the strengths of a school and community to address challenges.…

Describes a program offering freshman college courses to high school seniors designed to make senior year more challenging and help rural students' transition from high school to college. Discusses costs, curriculum, and student responses. Notes that successful students gain college credit while others learn they are not ready for college. (DHP)

Describes an ethnographic dissertation that portrays how patterns of culture and history in a rural community in Maine negatively influence many rural students' academic aspirations. Consolidated schools exacerbate the effect by separating students from their parents and communities and alienating them in school. (TD)