Rural Matters

Sometimes it seems to me that we live in a time with a prevailing ethic of I’ve-got-mine-you-take-care-of-your-own. Maybe it’s always been this way.

I was reflecting on this several weeks ago while I listened to yet another radio report of a wounded volunteer soldier back from Iraq whose family is losing almost everything as a result of his (in this case) service in the military. Do we have any sense of what we owe each other, I wondered, any sense of how we benefit from each other?

Later that day I began making calls to people in rural Arkansas for a story for Rural Policy Matters about ACRE, Advocates for Community and Rural Education. I talked to about eight people, mostly parents and community residents, including people who do not have kids in school but who nonetheless care.

I opened with a pretty general set of questions: tell me about ACRE and why you are a part of it.

The responses were a powerful antidote to what I heard on the radio.

Continue reading "Sharing Responsibility for Our Kids and Our Communities" »

Posted by Robin Lambert at 09:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

We wanted to know more about the rural school districts that serve high poverty communities so first we statistically rounded up the 7604 districts nationwide that have over half their students in a school that is physically located in a rural community. Then we identified the 800 – about 10 percent -- that have the highest rate of eligibility for the federal Title I program. That is the program providing funds for disadvantaged students. We’ll call these 800 high-poverty rural districts the "rural 800."

Continue reading to find out more about these districts and to see a chart of the 16 states where most Rural 800 districts are located.

Continue reading "The "Rural 800" Districts" »

Posted by Marty Strange at 09:24 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Legislators in Arkansas are working to ensure compliance with court orders in the Lakeview school funding case. Special masters appointed in the case are reviewing the 2006 legislative action on school funding, but are also receiving information on current proposals. The increase in student spending--$121.7 million by 2008--satisfies many of the plaintiff districts’ concerns. The state Senate has also passed legislation that would help districts with declining enrollment.

Posted by Robin Lambert at 02:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The long-running Lake View case will continue to be a factor in the Arkansas Legislature. Funding for school facilities is still on the table. Expect also to see more fighting over minimum school district size as well as criteria for districts to be put into fiscal or academic distress. Governor Mike Beebe (D) was elected in November. He supports universal pre-K programs, more support for after-school and summer programs, a statewide broadband infrastructure, and a traveling teacher program. Beebe has also pushed for consolidation in his 20-year history in the state senate. Arkansas is experimenting with pay-for-performance in a limited number of schools.

Posted by Robin Lambert at 04:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The state of Arkansas has for the last several years—and especially since the Supreme Court found the state school finance system unconstitutional—pursued aggressive policies to consolidate rural districts, and subsequently close small schools. Those policies are the subject of much contention in Arkansas. In the summer of 2006, the fight of the rural community of Paron to save its high school from closure became a flashpoint in the Arkansas debate over rural education.

But no matter where you live, if you care about honest reporting or rural kids or good education, it’s worth paying attention to what happened to Paron, especially in the press. That’s because what happened to Paron is a not just a travesty of justice, but an object lesson in the ways an irresponsible press does real harm to rural kids and their communities.

Continue reading "Why What Happened to Paron Matters, Even if You're Not From Arkansas" »

Posted by Robin Lambert at 12:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

The rural community of Paron, Arkansas has been the center of a media storm in that state for much of the summer. A rapid fire series of court actions re-opened, closed, re-opened, and then closed again Paron High School.

Several commentaries here on Rural Matters relate to how the state media in Arkansas covered the Paron story. Check out Facts Are Stubborn Things, Mr. Greenberg, Why Paron Matters, Even If You're Not From Arkansas, and Paron and the Propagandists.

In order to help our readers make sense of the Paron story and how it was covered, we’ve presented this news piece that summarizes events as they unfolded.

Continue reading "What Really Happened in Paron, Arkansas" »

Posted by Robin Lambert at 02:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Paul Greenberg’s been getting some mail. And he doesn’t like it.

The editorial page editor of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette said in a Sunday editorial (September 24, 2006) that he had been sent about a “zillion” copies of an article appearing on this Blog (“Facts are stubborn things, Mr. Greenberg,” posted September 8, 2006).

The article chided Greenberg for not leveling with Arkansans about the facts surrounding the closing of Paron High School. Paron High was forced to close after it was annexed by neighboring Bryant School District. The excuse Bryant gave for the closure was that Paron allegedly was unable to teach all of the 38 courses Arkansas high schools are required to teach each year.

Our article recited a pile of facts about the good performance of Paron students and about the circumstances surrounding the school’s efforts to teach journalism, one of the 38 required courses. Those facts were repeated by many writers who sent letters to the editor as well as emails to the Democrat-Gazette editorial page.

And Mr. Greenberg feels beleaguered and besieged by all this email. I doubt he got a zillion, but any number might have been a bit much for him.

He’s not used to seeing in print opinions he doesn’t agree with, unless he approves publishing them. As editorial

Continue reading "Paron and the Propagandist " »

Posted by Marty Strange at 10:44 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

"We are going to be able to take professional development where teachers are rather than simply asking them to come where we are. It also means we are using the latest tools and technology to give teachers the best tools of teaching an educational capacity."

Those are the words of Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee in announcing a new on-line program offered by the state Department of Education so teachers can take a required 60 hours of professional development courses annually through distance learning programs.

That’s the same Department of Education that requires that all high schools actually teach 38 required courses every year, with a certified teacher on site, whether students sign up for the course or not.

Nope, courses taught by distance learning cannot meet this requirement. Even if the course comes from the high school’s home district. Or from the state’s virtual high school. Kids can take distance learning courses, but that won’t relieve their high school of having to teach the 38 required courses.

Continue reading "Goose and Gosling" »

Posted by Marty Strange at 12:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

“Facts are stubborn things,” John Adams said, arguing for the Redcoat defendants in the Boston Massacre trial. He won their acquittal. It won’t be as easy for the people trying to get the facts in public view on the matter of the Arkansas Press Corps v. Paron High School.

That’s not a court case. That’s just a caption for the relentless diatribe against small schools, Paron in particular lately, spewing from the pundits who write columns, editorials, and cartons for the state’s editorial pages.

It’s a diatribe far more embarrassing than those pundits claim the state’s small schools are.

Continue reading "Facts Are Stubborn Things, Mr. Greenberg" »

Posted by Marty Strange at 08:10 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)