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Institute of Education Sciences

Education Across America: Exploring the Education Landscape in Distant and Remote Rural Areas

In Education Across America, we explore the condition of education across four main geographic locales: cities, suburbs, towns, and rural areas. In this blog post, we use select findings from Education Across America to focus on the experiences of elementary and secondary school students in distant and remote rural areas (find the definitions of these locales and sublocales).

This blog post provides a snapshot of these students’ experiences and includes data—which were collected at various points during the 2019–20 school year—on family characteristics, characteristics of student populations, characteristics of schools, school choice, coursetaking, and educational outcomes.


Family Characteristics

The percentage of children ages 5 to 17 who were living in poverty in remote rural areas was higher than the national average. Similarly, a higher percentage of students in remote rural areas lived in homes without internet access compared with all other sublocales.

  • In 2019, the percentage of related children1 ages 5 to 17 who were living in poverty was 21 percent in remote rural areas, which was higher than the national average of 16 percent.
  • In 2019, among the 43 states for which data were available, the percentages of children in remote rural areas living in poverty ranged from 6 percent in Vermont to 42 percent in Arizona. The states with the highest percentages of children in poverty in remote rural areas were concentrated in the West (e.g., Arizona, New Mexico) and the South (e.g., South Carolina, Georgia).
  • In 2019, the percentage of students who lived in homes without internet access or with access only through dial-up was higher in remote rural areas (11 percent) than in all other sublocales (ranging from 3 percent in large suburban areas to 9 percent in distant rural areas).
  • In 2019, the percentage of students who had fixed broadband internet access2 was lower in remote rural areas (69 percent) than in in all other sublocales except distant rural areas (ranging from 77 percent in remote towns to 88 percent in large suburban areas).

Explore more data on Children in Rural Areas and Their Family Characteristics and Rural Students’ Access to the Internet.


Characteristics of Student Populations

Public schools in remote and distant rural areas had smaller populations of Black, Hispanic, and English learner students compared with those in other sublocales. However, public schools in remote rural areas had a larger populations of students with disabilities.

  • In fall 2019, the percentage of public school students who were Black was lower in remote (6 percent) and distant (7 percent) rural areas than in all other sublocales (ranging from 7 percent in fringe towns to 24 percent each in large and midsize cities).3
  • In fall 2019, the percentage of public school students who were Hispanic was lower in distant and remote rural areas (each 10 percent) than in all other locales (ranging from 19 percent in fringe rural areas to 43 percent in large cities).
  • In fall 2019, the percentage of public school students identified as English learners (EL) was lower for school districts in distant and remote rural areas (3 and 4 percent, respectively) than for school districts in all other sublocales (ranging from 5 percent in fringe rural areas to 17 percent in large cities).
  • In fall 2019, the percentage of public school students who were students with disabilities was higher for school districts in remote rural areas (16 percent) than for districts in all other sublocales, which ranged from 13 percent in midsized cities to 15 percent each in fringe and distant rural areas, all three town sublocales, and midsized suburban areas.

Explore more data on Children in Rural Areas and Their Family Characteristics and English Learners and Students with Disabilities in Rural Public Schools.


Characteristics of Schools

When compared with public schools in other sublocales, public schools in distant and remote rural areas had smaller school enrollment sizes and lower ratios of students to staff and teachers—meaning the average staff member or teacher was responsible for fewer students.

  • In fall 2019, a lower percentage of public schools were located in remote rural areas than in other types of rural areas. Six percent of all public schools were located in remote rural areas, 10 percent were located in distant rural areas, and 11 percent were located in fringe rural areas. In comparison, 26 percent were located in large suburban areas and 15 percent were located in large cities.
  • In fall 2019, average public school enrollment sizes in distant rural areas (285 students) and remote rural areas (165 students) were smaller than those of all other sublocales (ranging from 402 students in schools in remote towns to 671 students in schools in large suburban areas).
  • In fall 2019, the average public school pupil/teacher ratios and pupil/staff ratios in distant rural areas and remote rural areas were lower than the ratios in all other sublocales.
    • For example, the average pupil/teacher ratios in distant rural areas (14.0) and remote rural areas (12.5) were lower than the ratios in all other sublocales (ranging from 15.4 to 16.9).

Explore more data on Enrollment and School Choice in Rural Areas and Staff in Rural Public Elementary and Secondary School Systems


School Choice

Enrollment in both charter schools and private schools was lower in remote rural areas than in larger towns and cities, reflecting limited access to alternative educational institutions in remote rural areas.

  • In fall 2019, the percentage of public school students enrolled in charter schools was lower in remote rural areas (2 percent) than in all other sublocales, which ranged from 2 percent each in distant towns and distant rural areas to 17 percent in large cities.4
  • In fall 2019, the percentage of students enrolled in private schools was lower in remote rural areas (3 percent) than in the other sublocales, which ranged from 5 percent in distant rural areas and fringe towns to 14 percent in large cities.

Explore more data on Enrollment and School Choice in Rural Areas.


High School Coursetaking

Compared with those from cities, a lower percentage of public and private high school graduates from remote rural areas had taken advanced math but a higher percentage had taken career and technical education (CTE) courses.

  • In 2019, the percentage of graduates in remote rural areas who had earned any advanced mathematics credits was lower than the percentage in large cities (85 vs. 93 percent).
  • In 2019, the percentage of graduates who had completed any CTE course was higher in remote rural areas (97 percent) than in most other sublocales (ranging from 75 percent in large cities to 92 percent in fringe towns).5
  • In 2019, a higher percentage of graduates in remote rural areas than in most other sublocales had taken courses in the following six CTE subject areas: agriculture, food, and natural resources; architecture and construction; human services; information technology; manufacturing; and transportation, distribution, and logistics.
    • For example, 47 percent of graduates in remote rural areas had taken a course in agriculture, food, and natural resources, while this percentage ranged from 3 percent for graduates in large cities to 24 percent in distant towns.
  • Conversely, the percentage of graduates who had taken a course in engineering and technology was lower for those in remote rural areas (5 percent) than for those in most other sublocales (ranging from 12 to 16 percent).

Explore more data on College Preparatory Coursework in Rural High Schools and Career and Technical Education Programs in Rural High Schools.


Educational Outcomes

Public high school graduation rates were higher in remote rural areas than in cities. Despite this relatively high graduation rate, the percentage of adults age 25 and over with at least a bachelor's degree in remote rural areas was lower than in all other sublocales.  

  • In 2019–20, the adjusted cohort graduation rate (ACGR) in remote rural areas (88 percent) was higher than the ACGRs in cities (ranging from 79 percent in large cities to 86 percent in small cities) and in remote towns (85 percent) but lower than the ACGRs in large and midsized suburban areas (89 percent each) and in fringe and distant rural areas (91 and 90 percent, respectively).
  • In 2019, the percentage of adults age 25 and over who had not completed high school in remote rural areas (13 percent) was higher than the percentages in 8 of the 11 other sublocales, not including large cities, distant towns, and remote towns.
  • In 2019, the percentage of adults age 25 and over who had earned a bachelor’s or higher degree in remote rural areas (19 percent) was lower than the percentages in all other sublocales, which were as high as 38 percent in large cities and large suburban areas.

Explore more data on Public High School Graduation Rates in Rural Areas and Educational Attainment in Rural Areas.


Check out the Education Across America hub and the indicators linked throughout this blog post to learn more about how the landscape of education varies by locale/sublocale. Be sure to follow NCES on XFacebookLinkedIn, and YouTube and subscribe to the NCES NewsFlash to stay informed when new locale-focused resources are released.

 

[1] Related children include all children who live in a household and are related to the householder by birth, marriage, or adoption (except a child who is the spouse of the householder). The householder is the person (or one of the people) who owns or rents (maintains) the housing unit.

[2] Excludes mobile broadband, but includes all other non-dial-up internet services, such as DSL, cable modem, and fiber-optic cable.

[3] Although both round to 7 percent, the unrounded percentage of students who were Black in fringe towns was higher than the unrounded percentage of students who were Black in distant rural areas (6.9 vs. 6.8 percent).

[4] In fall 2019, the percentage of students in remote rural areas who were enrolled in public charter schools was 1.6 percent, compared with 1.9 percent for students in distant towns and 2.0 percent for students in distant rural areas.

[5] Ninety percent of graduates in distant towns, 93 percent in remote towns, and 95 percent in distant rural areas had taken at least one CTE course. These percentages were omitted from the discussion because they were not measurably different from the percentage for remote rural areas.

Measuring Student Safety: New Data on Bullying Rates at School

NCES is committed to providing reliable and up-to-date national-level estimates of bullying. As such, a new set of web tables focusing on bullying victimization at school was just released.  

These tables use data from the School Crime Supplement to the National Crime Victimization Survey, which collects data on bullying by asking a nationally representative sample of students ages 12–18 who were enrolled in grades 6–12 in public and private schools if they had been bullied at school. This blog post highlights data from these newly released web tables.

Some 19 percent of students reported being bullied during the 2021–22 school year. More specifically, bullying was reported by 17 percent of males and 22 percent of females and by 26 percent of middle school students and 16 percent of high school students. Moreover, among students who reported being bullied, 14 percent of males and 28 percent of females reported being bullied online or by text.

Students were also asked about the recurrence and perpetrators of bullying and about the effects bullying has on them. During the 2021–22 school year, 12 percent of students reported that they were bullied repeatedly or expected the bullying to be repeated and that the bullying was perpetrated by someone who was physically or socially more powerful than them and who was not a sibling or dating partner. When these students were asked about the effects this bullying had on them,

  • 38 percent reported negative feelings about themselves;
  • 27 percent reported negative effects on their schoolwork;
  • 24 percent reported negative effects on their relationships with family and friends; and
  • 19 percent reported negative effects on their physical health.

Explore the web tables for more data on how bullying victimization varies by student characteristics (e.g., sex, race/ethnicity, grade, household income) and school characteristics (e.g., region, locale, enrollment size, poverty level) and how rates of bullying victimization vary by crime-related variables such as the presence of gangs, guns, drugs, alcohol, and hate-related graffiti at school; selected school security measures; student criminal victimization; personal fear of attack or harm; avoidance behaviors; fighting; and the carrying of weapons.

Find additional information on this topic in the Condition of Education indicator Bullying at School and Electronic Bullying. Plus, explore more School Crime and Safety data and browse the Report on Indicators of School Crime and Safety: 2022.

NCES Releases Indicators on Rural Education

NCES is excited to announce the release of five Education Across America indicators that focus on education in rural areas. These indicators—which summarize data patterns and provide analyses of the rural education experience—focus on the following topics:

For example, Rural Students’ Access to the Internet highlights the percentage of students in rural areas who had no internet access or only dial-up access to the Internet in 2019 (7 percent or 663,000 students). This percentage was higher than the percentages for students in towns (6 percent), cities (5 percent), and suburban areas (3 percent). In addition, compared with students in other locales, it was less common for students in rural areas to have fixed broadband internet access at home and more common for them to have only mobile broadband internet access at home. 


Figure 1. Percentage of 5- to 17-year-old students with no access to the Internet or only dial-up access to the Internet at home, by home locale: 2019

[click to enlarge image]

Horizontal bar chart showing the percentage of 5- to 17-year-old students with no access to the Internet or only dial-up access to the Internet at home in 2019, by home locale

NOTE: "No access to the Internet or only dial-up access to the Internet" includes households where no member accesses the Internet at home as well as households where members access the Internet only with a dial-up service. Data are based on sample surveys of the entire population residing within the United States. This figure includes only students living in households, because respondents living in group quarters (e.g., shelters, healthcare facilities, or correctional facilities) were not asked about internet access. Excludes children under age 15 who are not related to the householder by birth, marriage, or adoption (e.g., foster children) because their family and individual income is not known and a poverty status cannot be determined for them. Although rounded numbers are displayed, figures are based on unrounded data.

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Commerce, Census Bureau, American Community Survey (ACS), 2019, Restricted-Use Data File. See Digest of Education Statistics 2020, table 218.70.


These indicators are currently available through the Condition of Education Indicator System. To access them, select Explore by Indicator Topics and then select the Education Across America icon.


Image of the Condition of Education's Explore by Indicator Topics page highlighting the Education Across America section


Stay tuned for the release of additional indicators in early 2023. Then, in spring/summer 2023, check back to explore our highlights reports—which will explore key findings across multiple indicators grouped together by a theme—and our spotlight on distant and remote rural areas and the unique challenges they face.

Explore the Education Across America resource hub—including locale definitions, locale-focused resources, and reference tables with locale-based data—and watch this video to learn more about the hub. Be sure to follow NCES on TwitterFacebookLinkedIn, and YouTube and subscribe to the NCES News Flash to stay up-to-date on Education Across America releases and resources.

 

By Xiaolei Wang and Jodi Vallaster, NCES

Introducing NCES’s New Locale-Focused Resource Hub: Education Across America

NCES is excited to announce the release of a resource hub that focuses on data by geographic locale—Education Across America: Cities, Suburbs, Towns, and Rural Areas—using a three-phased approach. Released today, Phase I of this new resource hub involves the consolidation of locale-focused data across NCES surveys and programs and makes updates to the latest data available. The result of this work is 140 tables with data disaggregated by all four locales (i.e., cities, suburbs, towns, and rural areas). These tables cover a wide range of topics grouped into broad themes: family characteristics, educational experiences, school resources and staffing, and educational outcomes. Phases II and III will focus on rural areas and involve summarizing findings in text.

To make these data more relevant and useful, NCES adopted a pyramid approach1 to attend to various user segments with tiered products (exhibit 1). Source tables containing data disaggregated by locale form the base of the pyramid. These tables, which contain the most detailed statistical information about education in each locale, target data-savvy users such as researchers.


Exhibit 1. Tiered Approach to Products in Education Across America Resource Hub

Infographic showing pyramid with five levels of NCES products; from bottom to top: source tables, indicators, thematic summaries, briefs, and digital media


The next level is indicators. These indicators, comprising text and figures, will supply in-depth analyses that focus on rural areas. In order to make our data relevant and useful, literature review and focused groups were conducted to identify the topics that are important to education in rural areas. The target audience for these indicators is those who are looking for comprehensive discussions on specific topics in rural education.

The middle level of the pyramid is thematic summaries. These summaries synthesize findings across multiple indicators grouped together by a theme. In addition to thematic summaries, we will create a spotlight that focuses on distant and remote rural areas because these areas are confronted with unique challenges and are of particular policy interest. These products target education leaders in higher education and at the state and local levels.

The next level of the pyramid is briefs, which includes an executive summary on key findings about rural education and an at-a-glance resource that highlights important statistics about schools and students in rural areas. These products are designed as quick reads and target nontechnical audiences—such as state and local education leaders, associations, and policymakers—as well as individuals with an interest in education—such as educators and parents.

The final level of the pyramid is digital media, which includes blogs and social media posts that highlight key findings and resources available in the Education Across America resource hub. These products are designed to connect the media, parents, and educators with information on educational experiences across America.

Phase II involves the development of 5 to 10 indicators focused on the experience of schools and students in rural areas and is expected to be completed in June 2022. Phase III—which is expected to be completed in October 2022—consists of the development of the remaining indicators as well as the products in the thematic summaries and briefs tiers.

Check out our locale-focused research hub, Education Across America, today. Be sure to check back over the summer and fall to explore the hub as we release new products focusing on education in rural areas.

 

By Xiaolei Wang, Ph.D., NCES; and Jodi Vallaster, Ed.D., NCES


[1] Schwabish, J. (2019). “Use the Pyramid Philosophy’ to Better Communicate Your Research.” Urban Institute. https://www.urban.org/urban-wire/use-pyramid-philosophy-better-communicate-your-research; Scanlan, C. (2003). “Writing from the Top Down: Pros and Cons of the Inverted Pyramid.” Poynter. https://www.poynter.org/reporting-editing/2003/writing-from-the-top-down-pros-and-cons-of-the-inverted-pyramid/