In this conceptual article, we posit that Black life matters in the Black Belt of the American South. We connect two current trends in rural educational research--a return to questions of place and sincere attention to race as a crucial conversation in the field--and provide readers with an introduction to Black Geography as a means to inform…

This article is an effort to unveil how colonialism gets inscribed in research education initiatives during peace-building. To this end, we look behind the scenes of an education development project that sought to support a rural school in consolidating high-quality education during Colombia's recent peace process. We examine how, in our roles as…

Rural critical policy analysis (RCPA) goes beyond questions about whether a policy will "work" in a particular place, to examine the impact of policies on rural places. RCPA recognizes that policies represent the allocation of values--and that policy analysis cannot be separated from views of right and wrong. RCPA asks us to consider…

The National Center for Rural Education Research Networks (NCRERN) seeks to increase opportunity for rural students through the power of actionable data and evidence. NCRERN partners with networks of rural school districts to generate and evaluate strategies for improving student outcomes. For more information about NCRERN's work, see the…

Temporality is a relatively new conception in the field of education policy. Drawing upon historical sociology, this article aims to contribute to the field by deconstructing China's policy discourse - education modernization. It traces the history of the discourse (1904-2012) to analyze how Chinese rurality is interwoven into the nation's pursuit…

Consistent with their treatment of individual participants, educational researchers regularly use pseudonyms to reference their study sites. The rationales, strategies, and implications of masking places may differ from those for masking people. However, both practices are so pervasive as to have become unexamined defaults, and they are assumed as…

Resistance to simple narratives in education research comes from the stance that they render findings useless for the political work of understanding contexts of education as they exist today. This paper interrogates three stories of masking choices from a four year postcritical ethnographic study in the rural rustbelt Midwestern United States.…

Over the past two decades, interest and support for Universal Design for Learning (UDL) has prompted many teacher education programs in the United States to incorporate it into preservice curricula. Developed by CAST, an educational nonprofit, the UDL framework aims to support the design of inclusive educational environments by minimizing barriers…

While many remote places in Queensland, Australia have access to schools, very few have provision for preschool education. Recent efforts to change this have included the development of a kindergarten program delivered through the local school. An impact assessment undertaken in 2017 involved visiting 30 remote sites offering the program. Analysis…

In the wake of recent political events, rural people and places experience unfiltered and uncensored criticism. For the approximately 20% of America's children who are growing up in rural places, these stereotyped narratives are damaging and dehumanizing. To ensure the wellbeing of rural children across the United States, teacher education…

The National Center for Rural Education Research Networks (NCRERN) seeks to increase opportunity for rural students through the power of actionable data and evidence. NCRERN partners with networks of rural school districts to generate and evaluate strategies for improving student outcomes. For more background on NCRERN's work, see the Introduction…

The purpose of this paper is to present an exploration on the response of parents of two rural multigrade schools facing the homeschooling activities in the context of pandemics. To frame a comparative perspective some conceptual work was done about new rurality and family structure before interviewing parents of both schools about distribution of…

This paper uses Franco Berardi's "Futurability" to provide a critical examination of rural education, the manner in which it can limit radical imagination, as well as how it can be shaped to create new possibilities for the future. Using Berardi's theory as a critical lens, the author looks at existing research into rural education,…

As many as 41 million Americans live in "higher education deserts" -- at least half an hour's drive from the nearest college or university and with limited access to community college. Many of these deserts are in rural America, which is one reason so much of rural America is less prosperous than it deserves to be. The lack of higher…

In this essay, I explain how I switched the lens of my sophomore research unit to one that focuses on rural issues. This essay follows the unit from beginning to end. I explain what I do to raise awareness through the use of daily articles along with providing models for their own research. The essay then details the writing portion and how it has…