This paper describes four considerations for policymakers who wish to have public schools serve as viable partners in the rural development efforts of their communities. First, schools are a community resource. When rural students are given opportunities to engage in community-based learning, they develop responsible citizenship and leadership skills, increasing the community's social capital. Sustaining such opportunities requires the support of the local community and public policy. Second, how policymakers value rural places impacts how they think about and measure educational success. Our country seems to have forgotten that the top priority of schools is to serve the public good. Meanwhile, the chase for individual profit is depleting community after community as schools educate students to participate anywhere in the global economy, forgetting that "anywhere" usually means "elsewhere." Third, policymakers must understand rural development, strategies, and trends. Old sources of rural comparative advantage, such as cheap land and labor, are being replaced by quality of life; accountability for public tax dollars constrains the creation of large new rural programs; telecommunications can overcome geographic isolation; and small rural communities need to form new cooperative political units for education, service delivery, and public entrepreneurship. Finally, policymakers should study successful examples of rural school-community development partnerships to see which policy actions can replicate them. (Contains 26 references.) (TD)