With declining enrollments and budget limitations, it becomes more and more difficult for small rural schools to offer state-approved programs (often based on the "bigger is better" model of education). For many already consolidated districts, further consolidation is not a viable solution to the problem. Cooperative arrangements are…

This document describes collaboration by British providers of further and higher education to train workers for employment in rural based industries. After an introduction that reviews the need for such collaboration, the following five sections provide examples and two case studies of collaboration: (1) "Provision of Education and Training…

A consortium of universities in Utah developed a teacher training program in sensory impairments to address a long-term critical shortage of teachers qualified to service hearing-impaired/deaf and visually-impaired/blind students. The teacher shortage was a direct result of program cuts at the University of Utah. An advisory board was selected to…

According to this paper, rural community colleges face new challenges, which require openness to institutional partnerships that in the past may have been unthinkable due to traditional institutional competitiveness. These challenges include enrollment fluctuation, increased legislative scrutiny, calls for accountability, inadequate and…

During the late 1960's people of the Cheyenne River Sioux Reservation (a South Dakota area the size of Connecticut characterized by poverty, poor soil, aridity, and geographical isolation) began to consider establishment of an institution of higher education on the reservation. A consensus soon developed that a tribally-controlled community…

This manual recommends procedures for developing and operating a rural-based distance learning consortium. Following some brief definitions and an outline of the three basic essentials for success (trust, shared vision, and suitable telecommunication infrastructure), guidelines for developing a distance learning consortium are presented in five…

The rural Northeast Alabama Consortium for Professional Development is composed of five local school systems and an institution of higher learning that have joined together to share resources and enhance educational opportunities for teachers and students. The Consortium was formed as a result of the impact of three major factors: the Alabama…

A project was undertaken by a consortium to produce a publication that would provide (1) a mechanism and guidelines for establishing cooperative relationships between secondary and postsecondary schools and business, industry, and labor in the rural community; (2) a large number of examples of cooperative agreements; and (3) appendixes which will…