Research suggests that rural youth have lowereducational aspirations than their nonrural counterparts. This discrepancy has important implications foreducational policy and for achieving equality ofeducational opportunity, and it has led some topropose that action is necessary to reduce the rural-nonrural variation. However, while the existence of an aspiration difference seemsclear, neither its magnitude nor thereason for its existence is similarly transparent. Before undertaking remedial actions, it is well to ascertain the nature of whatever discrepancy exists. That is the purpose of thispaper. We find that the rural-nonruraldifference in adolescents' educational aspirations is quite small, and that about half of this discrepancy can be attributed to thewell-established divergence in socioeconomic status between rural and nonrural families. Our analyses also suggest thatmuch-perhaps all-of the remaining difference derives from the slightly disparate occupational aspirations of rural and nonrural youth. We conclude that a goal to eliminate the smalldifference in rural-nonruraleducational aspirations is likely to beunachievable. The discrepancy'sroots lie in patterns of family dynamics that are largely beyond the reach of educators. If, however, the aim is simply toreduce the discrepancy, this might beaccomplished by raising the occupational aspirations of rural youth. However, that strategy has its ownproblems, most notably that it is likely to exacerbate the migration of talented youngpeople from ruralareas.

Another Look at Rural-Nonrural Differences in Students' Educational Aspirations.

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Rural Youth: Ecological and Life Course Perspectives

This article examines the origins, influence, and contemporary understandings of class-based theories of student resistance in education, contributing to or emerging from Learning to Labor by Paul Willis. It reports the results of a review of the literature that discusses class-based student resistance and cites the seminal book. More than 500 published articles were reviewed, in addition to books and book chapters. This review reveals misconceptions in the literature that have developed around both the book and its theory. These misconceptions include the belief that the resistance theory described by Willis was original and that it was a drastic departure from reproduction theory, or at least correspondence theories like those of Bowles and Gintis, and that the resistance theory attributed to Willis, one of the most influential theories in contemporary critical scholarship in education, is the same theory that Willis himself describes. These misconceptions, and the failure to acknowledge them, raise que...

A Review of Class-Based Theories of Student Resistance in Education Mapping the Origins and Influence of Learning to Labor by Paul Willis

The Effects of Counseling on Classroom Performance

This investigation examined carry-over effects of high school size on extracurricular participation of 283 senior students at a large, multipurpose university. Results replicated previous findings in that students in smaller high schools showed greater extracurricular participation. However, extent of high school participation was a better predictor of college participation than was high school size. Students from smaller high schools were not more involved college participants. Overall, participation declined from high school to college, especially for females, with greater decline related to smaller school size. High participators participated more in college than low participators but showed greater decline. High participators from the smallest schools declined more than those from larger schools. Results suggest college participation is better explained by personal attributes predisposing students to participate and developmental tasks of late adolescence than it is by size of high school attended.

https://www.jstor.org/stable/info/1209240

Patterns of Extracurricular Participation from High School to College

Previous research reviewers have tended to overlook the rural student and the characteristics which may be unique to him and his situation. In this chapter, I attempt to identify those characteristics which, because they are unique, tend to cause the student in rural areas to become disadvantaged. During the last few years, a considerable amount of material was written about rural America, but little of it was based upon research. Although adequate research design is lacking in many of the studies, they do tend to give the best picture available of the rural student. Much of the material cited in this article is not available in published journals; it came from fugitive documents of limited circulation which fortunately are available through the ERIC system. A number of writers pointed out that rurality by its very nature may have caused pupils to be disadvantaged. Ackerson (1967) stated at the National Outlook Conference on Rural Youth that the incidence of incentive to remain in high school or in college was evidently not as great in rural America, as shown by the high dropout rate, and in all too many cases, the educational and vocational opportunities offered to rural young people were quite limited. Lamanna and Samora (1967) obtained similar findings in a study of Mexican American youth. They found that rural or urban residence was strongly related to educational status. Urban residents were almost always better educated than rural residents, regardless of sex, age, maturity, race, or parentage. It is difficult to make broad generalizations other than those previously mentioned, concerning disadvantaged rural students. Such groups as the mountain folk of the Appalachian region, the Southern rural Negroes, the American Indians, or the Spanish-speaking youth of the Southwest have special problems. In addition, characteristics are often quite different for persons within the major groupings. Berman (1965) noted that it was invalid to consider all Indian students, no matter which tribal affiliation they maintained, as \"just Indians\" and to prepare an over-all program which purported to be adapted to the \"Indian population.\" Similarly, it is not acceptable to lump all Spanish-speaking students together under

Everett D. Edington

Papers

4: Disadvantaged Rural Youth