STEM Education in Rural Communities: Are We Doing Enough to Cultivate Talent?

An essay by Steven Forsythe

Growing up in a small farming town, I learned quickly that if you were interested in something, you had to take initiative to learn more. There wasn’t high-speed internet or a roster of experts in the area to learn from; instead, you sought out opportunities and hoped there may be a week-long interest camp within a two-hour drive to give you the chance to learn more. This was if your parents had the time, patience, and finances to do so. There were few available college preparatory courses, including advanced placement (AP) exams which help to reduce the time and cost of college educations. Within your school, there was one or maybe two teachers available to teach an entire subject, including chemistry, biology, engineering, and physics. These teachers are responsible for teaching every educational level from elementary, middle, to high school, making it difficult to stay current and customize lesson plans to fit the needs of the students. If you were genuinely interested in STEM curriculum or at the higher end of performance, it was more likely you would be left alone than encouraged as teachers needed to focus on those who needed focus to improve scores. These are the types of situations roughly one in five students find themselves facing, spread out in half of all high schools. It is imperative to address these shortcomings to equalize educational experiences and raise the quality of STEM education.

?Across the nation, the picture is very similar over time in rural areas. These persistent issues can be broken into three major categories: resources, communication, and talent retention. Rural areas are isolated from larger cities, which leads to both less material and personal support for students contributing to a lack of exposure and reduced interest in STEM careers. Due to rural isolation, these areas have a 3% higher rate of poverty when compared to urban regions. This is linked to wage stagnation, higher unemployment, population drain, and lower support for students from their families. In addition to the shortage of materials and teachers, high speed internet, an essential tool for not only students but teachers, is poorly distributed throughout rural areas. However, according to a recent report by the?Federal Communications Commission, fixed terrestrial 25/3 Mbps broadband, the FCC benchmark speed for internet, is lacking for 22.3 percent of Americans in rural areas and 27.7 percent of Americans in Tribal lands, a stark difference compared to only 1.5 percent of Americans in urban areas. Another recent poll highlighted that 58% of rural citizens as seeing access to high speed internet as an issue, compared to 43% of urban citizens. Additionally, scientific misinformation is heightened in smaller rural communities. This misinformation is on a wide range of topics, from the opioid epidemic to COVID-19, creating substantial health burdens on these communities. This coupled with their isolation, compounds into local health crises along with reduced trust in individuals with STEM related careers.

?Inside of the school, other issues are apparent. The recruitment of teachers to rural communities has demonstrated historical difficulties, with solutions such as higher salaries and loan forgiveness being proposed to cover this gap. Yet considering this as a solution still leaves lower resource access to materials leading to limitations in lesson plans. Access to AP courses demonstrates stark differences in the number of rural schools offering courses and the number of AP courses offered both contributing to lower numbers of students taking AP courses when compared to urban and suburban school districts. Access to AP courses is important as it provides several benefits, including educational, financial, and psychological, which can prepare students for college. While rural students are just as likely to graduate high school as their urban peers, they are less likely to attend or graduate college. As 60% of STEM positions are filled by those with at least a bachelor’s degree, this remains a hurdle to many STEM careers. After they do graduate, research has shown that after students graduate, they are less likely to return to rural communities exacerbating the “brain” and talent drain from those areas, although this may be beginning to change. This migration can further lead towards stagnation of education efforts, as highly educated young members of the local community leave without being replaced.

?Despite these shortcomings, the need for STEM education as it relates to the future of the United States has never been higher. One quarter of the US workforce works in the STEM field, which saw a 20% increase in jobs from 2011-2021. STEM related careers are rising at a rate two times higher than the total of other disciplines. As traditional careers including those in the service industry, manufacturing, and mid-level management are faced with phasing out due to automation and artificial intelligence, STEM related careers are seeing an increasing demand, especially in software. In addition to job opportunities the average salary of STEM related careers is $98,000 which is over two times higher than those of non-STEM careers at $45,000. During our lives, we have seen leaps and bounds forward in technology prowess, as we continue down this road, we will need STEM educated minds from all backgrounds to continue our path forward. Unfortunately, studies comparing education across countries have indicated the United States falls outside the top ten, including in science (11th out of 78) and math (30th out of 78). These scores have been stagnant for years, and in some areas have fallen slightly. Thus, it is imperative to improve these outcomes to continue both competitive standards and STEM progression in the United States.

?This is not to say there hasn’t been legislation to remedy these issues. The Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965?(ESEA) allows for two Rural Education Achievement Programs (REAP): ?the Small, Rural School Achievement (SRSA) program and the Rural and Low-Income School (RLIS) program. These programs provide financial support for both smaller and low-income rural communities to achieve pre-defined criteria. More recently, H.R. 210- the Rural STEM Education Research Act (2021) was passed with widespread bipartisan support to improve training to STEM faculty, increase funding in research education in rural communities, and increasing access to broadband internet. In a post-COVID era, this emphasis to improve virtual learning not only demonstrate a method of keeping students on-track due to missed in person time, but they also create windows to the larger world and increase exposure in STEM fields. Substantial work has been performed in the past few years to improve internet infrastructure, including through the? Bipartisan Infrastructure Act (2021) which provides $65 billion to improve access throughout the United States. Other recent programs, the ReConnect Program and the Broadband Equity Access and Deployment Program, were developed to address rural internet access. These programs are essential in keeping smaller communities competitive and to maintain educational standards across the United States. Newer legislation, including the Rebuild Rural America Act, has been proposed to increase funding towards developing rural communities and schools in addition to supporting agriculture.

?To encourage STEM growth in rural communities, there are still a plethora of legislative actions needed to move forward. Continued legislative support, from direct educational support for schools to infrastructure support for roads and internet, is imperative to help continue the growth and improved education of students from rural communities. The development of online programs for rural STEM education can assist to cover the shortfalls of lower numbers of staff present at rural schools, a process already being implemented and planned. The work to improve high speed internet access has demonstrated huge gains, with an almost 25% gain of access in the last 5 years.

?Outside of traditional four-year colleges, other options should be considered for those who want to enter the workforce sooner or desire closer options. One potential area of focus is using career and education through technical schools. These schools often have shorter durations with more career-based programs, are smaller with more focused teaching, and can typically be completed within two years. This allows for shorter commutes and with part time potential. Rural communities already outpace the attendance of these programs over urban districts in several fields outside of STEM. Improving STEM programs and adapting them for rural communities may lead to an increase in STEM education for those communities.

?Other areas of improvement are less about legislation and more about outreach. For all the growth in STEM education, the field is still male dominated, with almost two thirds of positions occupied by men. Women are strongly discouraged from joining STEM careers, with almost 70% of those with STEM degrees finding themselves in a non-STEM related career. Women in rural communities have historically been underemployed, despite the demand for training. Improved STEM education and training can lead to improved employment options for both women and all others underrepresented minorities from these communities. Finally, improving scientific communication, an issue which has become increasingly important in the modern world of misinformation, is imperative to not only improve STEM interest in the rural community, but also to ensure future prosperity. Efforts should be made both inside and outside schools to educate students in reading scientific literature will help students and the community is taking away the right message from the literature, while helping improve the overall understanding of science to aid in combating misinformation. This enhanced understanding will also help the students and community at large take advantage of the newest advancements to stay competitive in the modern world.

?As I stated in the beginning, my education came without many of the resources present in schools located in urban/suburban areas. Despite this, my classmates and I entered a wide range of STEM related careers, from doctors, pharmacists, nurses, researchers, engineers, mechanics, software programmers, farmers and more. Support from the people in our community helped to make up this gap, and the passion to learn and grow was never missing. With more support, future rural generations will have the proper tools at the ready to improve STEM education, leading to careers with higher income and improving rural communities for the long term.

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