Examines the applicability of two alternative theories of small-town politics to a case of Mexican American political mobilization in Woodburn, Oregon, where Mexican Americans comprised half the population. Discusses Mexican American attempts to promote a housing project for migrant workers and to pressure the school board to reflect Mexican…

Study investigated the relationships among neighborhood informal social control, crime, and negative peer culture; students' sense of school coherence; and students' educational behavior. Neighborhood crime had a substantial negative effect on their educational behavior that was not mediated by a sense of school coherence. Discusses implications…

Addresses the many issues community colleges currently face, including decreased state and federal funding, increased competition from for-profit colleges, the digital divide, and enrollment and retirement trends. Suggests that institutions interact with their environments in better, fundamentally different ways. (Contains 14 references.) (NB)

Offers seven recommendations (with comments) for action involving school partnerships with families and communities: Involve and support teachers and principals, adopt democratic principles, reach out to parents, encourage parent activism, provide parents with opportunities for choice and voice, encourage and support increased family…

Describes the expansion of music education from a negligible presence in city schools at the turn of the century to its implementation throughout rural education. Connects this expansion to the Country Life Movement, a Progressive Era reform aimed at improving conditions in rural areas. (MJP)

Suggests that school-to-work initiatives can be an important policy tool for rural development. Discusses key components of school-to-work systems (school-based learning, work-based learning, and connecting activities); national and international trends impacting rural economies; rural advantages and weaknesses related to economic development; and…

Seventh- and eighth-grade students in a small Vermont town publish a community newspaper. Students learn writing skills, organizing, meeting deadlines, computer skills, problem solving, production skills, and much about their community while meeting Vermont's academic cross-disciplinary standards. Teacher comments describe the 3-year development…

Examines adaptations made by one high school when the surrounding city shifted from a textile mill-driven manufacturing economy to a post-industrial service economy. Using data from an extended field study, the paper examines how school discourses emerged from three related sources (a corporate sponsor, competition for good students, and preparing…

Realizes the importance of rural schools, since they comprise seventy percent of Russian schools. Highlights measures taken in strengthening these schools' perceptions of themselves. Addresses problems that affect the success of rural schools and discusses different solutions, such as developing curricula and teaching materials specifically for…

Discusses burgeoning charter-school movement in Arizona and its effect on public schools. Asserts evidence gathered through surveys and interviews suggests competition incrementally improves education for all students. Identifies ways in which schools hit hardest by competition react and refutes critics' claims regarding school choice. Discusses…

Describes technology use in Union City (New Jersey) schools. Explains a Bell Atlantic partnership that provided computers; and discusses a course designed by the Center for Children and Technology (CCT) to build student experts in technology, including relationships with community agencies, HTML, Web site design, storyboarding, using Spanish and…

Federally funded, Haskell Indian Nations University serves American Indian and Alaska Native students from federally recognized tribes and villages. Haskell's American Indian Studies baccalaureate program is an interdisciplinary, culturally relevant program that provides students with practical skills needed by tribes. The need for American Indian…

A community economic development organization in rural Ireland partnered with a technical college to build a college to teach furniture design and manufacturing, with an emphasis on entrepreneurship and new production technologies. The college has been successful in attracting good students and helping them find employment. A research and…

Discusses ways in which Oglala Lakota College (South Dakota) helps to strengthen the cultural fabric of the Lakota community and how it has partnered with other institutions of higher learning throughout the state. Reports that the college has a number of community-based initiatives that emphasize the relationship between academics and ancestral…

It is time to stop viewing rural schools and communities as deficient and build on their tremendous assets--small size, an understanding of the connection between humans and nature, greater access to civic life, strong school-community ties, a sense of place and community, and cultural diversity. Examples describe innovative programs initiated by…