Teacher retention in high-poverty middle schools is a topic of concern. Teachers make the decision to leave the profession for a variety of reasons. Induction programs are put in place to for support with the goal of helping new teachers remain in the profession. The purpose of this mixed-methods study was to identify critical components of…

Public high school principals (n = 130) participated in a study comparing extracurricular activities available at high schools located in poverty areas with extracurricular activities available at high schools not located in poverty areas. Results indicated that high schools in poverty areas are, in general, characterized by fewer extracurricular…

Each year, rural school districts and economically depressed areas struggle to attract and keep certified teachers. Resources, finance, and lack of local attractions are what cause teachers to leave rural areas. These difficulties have made some of the best instructors unsatisfied with their school district, which has led them to look for a school…

In order to assist in alleviating the teaching shortage in poor, rural school districts, also known as Local Education Agencies (LEA's), faculty in the College of Education at Mississippi State University sought funding that would provide financial support for a new alternate route teaching program. This program, known as Learning and Educating…

Writing is an essential skill for participating in modern American society. Although it is crucial to careers and civic engagement, student writing falls far short of national expectations (College Board, 2004; NCES, 2012; Persky, Daane, & Jin, 2003). The Common Core State Standards (CCSS) seek to increase the rigor of writing instruction…

As part of the Community and Environment in Rural America (CERA) initiative, the Carsey Institute has been investigating broad trends between rural community types, including the education level of residents and their parents. Since 2007, Carsey researchers have conducted over 17,000 telephone surveys with randomly selected adult Americans from…

The findings of the Citizen's Board of Inquiry are that: (1) hunger and malnutrition affect millions of Americans and are increasing in severity each year; (2) infant deaths, organic brain damage, retarded growth and learning rates, increased vulnerability to disease, withdrawal, apathy, alienation, frustration, and violence result from hunger and…

Some 97 families (having 500 children) who live in the Louise-Midnight area of Mississippi were interviewed for this study conducted in 1968. The 45-minute interviews were taped, and excerpts from the tapes serve as starting points for disussions in the document on areas such as employment, food habits, health and health care, political climate,…

The author arrived at the Delta Principals Institute with low expectations and the same obstacles facing other principals from poverty-stricken areas: poor student achievement, staff apathy, lack of parental support, superannuated curricula, and poor community support. There he learned how to overcome these obstacles by using a more participative…

This paper, one of a series which arose out of data gathered on Choctaw Indians, Negroes, and whites in a low income area of Mississippi, expands upon one aspect of a recently completed analysis by the author. In the study, an attempt was made to distinguish between the characteristics associated with income levels and those related to ethnic…

A broad technical assistance program has been established in 25 EDA (Economic Development Administration) contract counties and on the Choctaw Indian Reservation Nashoba County) to stimulate new job opportunities by solving operational problems which limit the expansion and diversification of existing industry; professional services in evaluating…

The National Rural Studies Committee seeks to identify important rural problems and encourage scholarly work on such problems. This annual meeting focused on the relationships between rural poverty and race relations and between rural and urban problems. Individual papers are: (1) "The Rural South as Seen by a Historical Geographer," by…

Offering an overview of the adult education program of Quitman County, Mississippi and its development from 1967 to 1969, the report reviews the history of the community-based project, community problems, resident participation, and project objectives. Begun in 1967 as a volunteer program in adult education for the poor of that rural Delta region,…

Single mothers' participation rates in Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) in rural Mississippi were influenced by community-level characteristics: educational attainment, racial composition, employment structure, civic engagement, and spatial concentration of poverty. Particularly, TANF participation rates were higher in the Delta and…

The report provides a detailed review of the seven and one-half year Mississippi Labor Mobility Project, STAR, Inc., whose operations and research concerned the utility and feasibility of subsidizing worker relocation assistance to the unemployed/underemployed poor for the purposes of improving their economic and social opportunities. Almost 2,500…