Welcome to Mile Markers, a twice-a-month newsletter about rural higher education.
If you’re a young student in Livingston, Alabama, it’s likely that many of your principals and teachers are alumni of the University of West Alabama. At SUNY Potsdam, students don’t travel far from the campus – located in “the shadow of the Adirondacks,” as Provost Susan L. Perkins put it – to complete research projects in the rural landscape around them. And Washington Monthly’s features editor Gillen Tener Martin grew up near Cal Poly Humboldt, where she remembered attending school plays on campus or watching the high school football team play at the university’s stadium.
This is what I’m starting to think about when I try to understand the value of rural colleges. Many times, these institutions are part of the fabric of the communities where they are based, stitched into the everyday lives of people who may not even have a direct tie to the university.
These colleges also appeared on the Washington Monthly’s recent rankings of the “Best Colleges for Rural America,” which provides a more data-based answer to this question of value and returns for students.
The rankings
This is the first time the Washington Monthly is including a separate ranking for rural-serving institutions, and the way they are evaluating these colleges leans more heavily on access and affordability for rural students.
To determine these rankings, Washington Monthly staff first pulled the list of more than 1,000 rural-serving institutions from the Alliance for Research on Regional College’s Rural-Serving Post-Secondary Institutions project. Then, they limited that pool to only four-year nonprofit colleges and universities and those with admission rates at 75% or higher.
From those 225 colleges, they then looked at a variety of factors, including:
- Percent of a college’s students on Pell Grants
- Annual net price that students from median-income and below families pay
- Median student loan debt
- Earnings of their alumni
Martin said she hopes this ranking helps highlight colleges that may not have the name recognition of big flagship schools, but are clearly connecting local rural students to education and career opportunities. As rural residents are seeing their local institutions close or cut programming, Martin said that the ranking serves as an argument for increased state investment in rural regional colleges.
“I hope it gives people an understanding of the systemic context that these schools are operating in, and sort of shifts the blame onto something bigger that we could actually fix,” Martin said. “It is a reasonable fix. It is an achievable fix.”
What do these universities think?
While these data points are helpful, I was curious how these universities’ leaders viewed how they are measuring up. How does this information fit into the stories the universities are telling?
I reached out to the top 10 institutions on the list and asked each of them how they are currently showing up for rural students and what higher education could do better for these students. Five of those universities responded by email or with a Zoom interview before scheduling this newsletter.
Affordability was mentioned in nearly every response, with examples like the Humboldt First Scholarship, which provides first-year students who graduate from nearby high schools with $1,000 per year, up to four years. Perkins, the provost and senior vice president of academic affairs at SUNY Potsdam, also focused on scholarships offered specifically for internships, research opportunities, study abroad and other professional experiences.
These university leaders again emphasized accessibility, highlighting flexible online programs that can be particularly useful for students who are parents, caregivers or who lack reliable transportation or proximity to campus.
But what stood out to me the most was how these universities are working to support students once they arrive, beyond just getting them in seats. Multiple people named specific programs centered around guidance and mentorship for students, like University of the Cumberlands’ Student Success Coordinators or how the University of West Alabama has revamped their academic advising to focus more on career coaching.
Universities need to go beyond helping rural students access college, according to Robert Ayala, acting vice president of student success at Texas A&M University-Kingsville. Instead, Ayala wrote that the goal “should be creating a connected educational ecosystem in which where a student lives does not limit how far their education, talent, and ambition can take them.”
This interconnectedness is something that Todd Fritch, president of the University of West Alabama, emphasized, too. Especially as the primary university in the Black Belt region of Alabama, UWA has focused on how they can support the local economy by leaning on their programs’ strengths. For a school that started as a women’s teaching college, that often looks like supporting rural teachers and soon-to-be teachers.
If UWA isn’t playing the role of the “economic development engine,” nobody else is, Fritch said. “It’s a unique responsibility that we have, I think, as a rural-serving institution to do those things for the community in ways in which other universities don’t have to think about it.”
Multiple administrators pointed out strong relationships with local high schools and dual enrollment programs, but others said these connections could be even stronger. They want to see career and technical education more seamlessly lead to certificates, associate or bachelor’s degrees.
This means playing a more active role in helping students understand what opportunities exist and adapting to what those students need, too.
“More rural students need to see higher education as both possible and relevant to the future they want to build,” wrote University of the Cumberlands President Quentin R. Young, who grew up in rural Whitley County, Kentucky, and has four degrees from Cumberlands. “That starts with keeping the cost of college within reach. It also means recognizing that there is no single pathway that works for every student.”
What I’m reading and attending
Two quick things that caught my attention this week:
- This story about what investment in modern agriculture training looks like at community colleges. I briefly spoke with Leah Barrett, the president of Northeast Community College in Nebraska, a couple of months ago when she told me that precision agriculture is one of their largest programs. According to this story, the college recently launched a 16-credit Agriculture Drone Pilot Certificate.
This piece also reminded me to freshen up on the Farm Bill, so if anyone would be interested in chatting about these proposed grants for “Community College Agriculture and Natural Resources Programs,” let me know!
- And I’m looking forward to digging more into this map from the Institute for College Access and Success, which breaks down rural areas by commuting distances.
I’ll be tuning in to the virtual version of this event from Wisconsin Watch and Open Campus on Tuesday, Oct. 6, and if you live near Madison, you could even join for breakfast in person!
I’m starting my oh-so-long drive from Missouri to southeastern Pennsylvania today (wish me luck) where I’ll be based for the month of October. I’ll take a break from the car and take the train up to New Hampshire for Radically Rural Oct. 6-8, and then the rest of the month you’ll find me on the family farm for pumpkin season.
This time of year reminds me of my grandfather. He started growing strawberries as a U-pick business after encouragement from his agriculture teacher in high school. He delivered eggs with his father, then later with his wife. He worked in the Air Force, teaching people carpentry or leather work. He clocked in many hours at the Chrysler plant. And, of course, he started a pick-your-own pumpkin business that lasted generations to this day. Talk about a winding path through education, careers and life.
I’m sure I will have more current photos from the farm to share with you in the next edition, a couple weeks from now! In the meantime, feel free to share Mile Markers with anyone else who might be interested, or subscribe here if you were forwarded this email.
Thanks for reading and loving rural.
Talk soon,
Emily
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