Although there are many concepts and ideas proposed to reform mathematics education, especially in rural areas, the experience of actual reform embeds many ironies. In the United States, some researchers and educators try to change the role of mathematics in rural context. From a Thai outlook, however, the difficulty is that this role is not going…

Based on one of the most widely used datasets by foreign-based sociologists, this paper examines the rate of returns to education in rural China. Compared with the previous studies that showed rather low rates in rural areas throughout the 1980s, this study finds a considerably higher rate in 1996. A chief contributor is the rapid non-agricultural…

Understanding human activity in real-world situations often involves complicated data collection, analysis, and presentation methods. This article discusses how Cultural-Historical Activity Theory (CHAT) can inform design-based research practices that focus on understanding activity in real-world situations. I provide a sample data set with…

This article describes how students in rural parts of West Virginia spend up to four hours a day riding buses to far-flung schools, built as part of the state's consolidation drive. As a result, rural communities in West Virginia have fought back by filing lawsuits, electing their allies to school boards, and defeating pro-consolidation bond…

Based on a survey of rural school districts in Western China, this essay explores the effects of fiscal centralisation on the relationship between local governance and school district management, most particularly on how managerial power is distributed in the rural education sector. The essay also examines some of the possible effects that changes…

While metropolitan school systems are moving toward decentralization and personalized instruction, rural America is still being coerced into consolidations and district mergers. The Annenburg Rural Challenge, a force for nontraditional reform, is sponsoring bold, community-based initiatives aimed at transforming teaching and learning in genuinely…

Academic discourse relating to the cultural relevance of indigenous education is ever expanding both nationally in Canada and internationally. Reflecting upon recent research data as well as lived experience as a teacher educator in Nunavut, I offer a critique of some well-established beliefs connected to considerations of culturally appropriate…

We are delighted to welcome you to the International Conference on Education and New Developments 2013, taking place in Lisbon, Portugal, from 1 to 3 of June. Education, in a global sense, is a right since we are born. Every experience has a formative effect on the constitution of the human being, in the way one thinks, feels and acts. One of the…

In this article we discuss the relationship between place-based education and standards-based reforms. Using an initiative in Vermont to include place-based standards into the state's curricular frameworks, we examine state policy makers' and practitioners' views of state standards and place-based curriculum. Furthermore, we explore the ways in…

This article uses a case study of rural education in Ghana to investigate an important element of the decentralisation agenda--community participation in schooling. Drawing on a theoretical framework derived from Bourdieu, it argues that schooling and community life are two distinct and differently structured fields. The research demonstrates how…

The rural educational socium represents the foundation of individual and social educational resources. Among the key provisions of the strategy for modernizing the rural educational socium, the authors list the following: the creation of an integral system of continuous education in the immediate vicinity of the place where youngsters and adults…

A focus on rurality has been largely absent from much contemporary educational policy discussion. At best, rural education is a peripheral concern just as rural areas are increasingly considered marginal to the development of a globalized, networked, fast capitalism. In Canada rural, coastal, northern, and single-industry communities that were…

In addition to exploring importance of rural education, prevailing forces and trends impacting it, and necessity for change, the monograph explores some vital aspects for the future of rural education, i.e., expanded use of modern technology; increased priority among governmental, educational, and civic organizations for dealing with problems and…

The tech prep program at Swansea High School in South Carolina was recognized as the best program in the Southeast by the U.S. Department of Education. The high school is involved in the Southern Regional Education Board's "High Schools that Work" program. (JOW)