Rural communities are not a monolith; they have unique challenges that require unique policy solutions. One of the best ways to understand the diversity of those challenges -- and, in turn, identify the most effective solutions -- is to hear directly from rural communities. This Special Report analyzes data from a 2020 Strada Education…

The effects of mixed-reality teaching experiences on participants' perceptions of their classroom management ability are evaluated using a mixed-methods design. Mursion, a technology that enables virtual simulations, is used. Participants include 29 undergraduates pursuing a degree in special education for learners with mild or moderate/severe…

Inertia created by the 15 years of teacher quality reform leading up to Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), coupled with a renewed focus on innovation and flexibility under ESSA, might provide a recipe for establishing new ways to recruit, develop, and retain teachers in rural schools. Many hope that the development of complex and tailored staffing…

The Essential Three (e3) is a professional learning series that focuses on supporting rural school districts and school leaders as they engage in the important work of prioritizing and determining areas of instructional focus. As educators transition to new rigorous state and national standards and face the challenges of learning newly adopted…

Providing high-quality special education services in rural settings has a variety of challenges such as geographic isolation and a lack of resources. One particularly challenging aspect of rural special education is providing general curriculum access. Computer-assisted instruction is one way to provide high-quality specialized instruction that…

This paper investigates the extent to which civic education is achieving its goals of teaching democracy and producing responsible democratic citizenship in Lesotho. This is done by analysing the conceptions of civic education, democracy, public participation, human rights, freedoms and responsibilities that appear in Lesotho's documents that are…

Digital media is becoming increasingly important to learning in today's changing times. At the same time, digital technologies and related digital skills are unevenly distributed. Further, deficit-based notions of this digital divide define the public's educational paradigm. Against this backdrop, I forayed into the social reality of one rural…

In 1959, C. Wright Mills coined the phrase "the sociological imagination" to offer a critical assessment of a discipline he saw descending into a technical or abstract empiricist practice that he feared would ultimately deepen human alienation and oppression. Mills positioned the sociologist as a careful, critical scholar working in the…

Traditional career education activities at the secondary level consist of academic, aptitude, skills, interests, and, less often, personality assessments that assist students in narrowing viable career options. Although this strategy is reasonable, its attempt to objectify the career decision-making process does not address two important…

Professional rank is an important indicator of the professional capacity of compulsory education teachers. A rational professional rank evaluation system plays an important role in mobilizing the enthusiasm of teachers, improving the overall quality of teachers, and promoting the development of education. Based on stratified random sample data…

A critical aspect of rural research is carefully defining and describing the rural context. This is particularly important in rural special education research because different definitions of rural may influence resource allocation, grant funding eligibility, and/or research findings. In order to highlight the importance of operationalizing rural,…

K-12 online distance education is growing rapidly and many organizations focus on virtual schooling in Canada. The centre for Distance Learning and Innovation (CDLI) was established in 2000 in Newfoundland and Labrador and has been offering numerous opportunities to rural high school students through online distance education. In this paper, the…

Children of migrant farmworkers change schools frequently and must navigate through a maze of confusing and often inconsistent academic policies. Migrant students are often identified as English learners and some have disabilities, which results in additional academic and federal policies that families must contend with as they seek to support…

In this qualitative study, we examine the experiences of South African multilingual learners and one local teacher after participating in a community-based, digital storytelling project on career dreams. A secondary purpose was to uncover the skills, knowledge, and abilities learners used as they created digital stories that reflected their future…

The Rural Math Innovation Network (RMIN) is a 4-year project that launched in January 2017 after receiving a $2.9 million Investing in Innovation (i3) development grant from the U.S. Department of Education (ED) and matching funds from the private sector. Virginia Ed Strategies and rural local education agencies (LEAs) in Virginia are implementing…