AERA Rural Education SIG: Special Issue - Learning To Leave: The Irony Of Schooling In A Coastal Community

Sunday, July 11, 2010

Special Issue - Learning To Leave: The Irony Of Schooling In A Coastal Community

About a year ago, the Journal of Research in Rural Education hosted a special issue (that I had suggested to the editor during the Rural Education Special Interest Group's business meeting at the annual meeting of the American Education Research Association about a year earlier). The special issue was focused on Michael Corbett's book, Learning to Leave: The Irony of Schooling in a Coastal Community, an ethnography examining the impact of education on a rural, fishing community in Nova Scotia, Canada.

The special issue begins with Michael's journal article summary of his findings in Learning to Leave: The Irony of Schooling in a Coastal Community, along with his reflections on those findings since the original publication of the book. This article is followed by other articles from scholars in a variety of rural contexts, reflecting upon Michael's book (and article) in their own rural environments. The special issue ends with a commentary or response from Michael to the other authors. All of these articles are listed below:

M. Corbett - Rural Schooling in Mobile Modernity: Returning to the Places I've Been
A. Woodrum - Cultural Identity and Schooling in Rural New Mexico
S. Faircloth - Re-visioning the Future of Education for Native Youth in Rural Schools and Communities
D. Greenwood - Place, Survivance, and White Remembrance: A Decolonizing Challenge to Rural Education in Moile Modernity
U. Kelly - Learning to Lose: Rurality, Transience, and Belonging (A Companion to Michael Corbett)
M. Corbett - Assimilation, Resistance, Rapprochement, and Loss: Response to Woodrum, Faircloth, Greenwood, and Kelly

I highlight this special issue here because I am often asked about my research agenda or the focus of my research. I generally respond something to the effect of that I have an interest in the effective design and delivery online learning to K-12 students in virtual school environments, particularly those in rural jurisdictions. I always add the "particularly those in rural jurisdictions" because my first teaching position was in a rural jurisdiction - very much like the one Michael describes in his book and the original article in this special issue.

This entry is crossposted as Special Issue - Learning To Leave: The Irony Of Schooling In A Coastal Community on Virtual School Meanderings.