Rural Divide

Rural Housing Group Warns of Looming Crisis for Renters

The nation is not keeping pace with repairing and replacing more than 400,000 affordable rental units that serve low-income rural residents. Without action, a cascade of rentals will age out of the program, creating a housing gap that could contribute to rural population loss, according to the Housing Assistance Council. […]

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Bipartisan Support for Rural Housing Keeps Programs Alive

Congress has ignored requests from the Trump administration to zero out rural housing programs. But merely protecting current funding will not address rural housing needs adequately, advocates say. Building stronger rural communities requires creating new housing initiatives, not just preserving the housing stock that is already in place, says the head […]

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School-Wide Free Nutrition Program Attracts Fewer Rural Schools

Rural schools are less likely to participate in district-wide free lunch and breakfast programs despite the fact that rural families typically have more economic need for the nutrition program, according to a recent analysis from U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Economic Research Service. The study of the USDA Community Eligibility Program found that […]

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West Main Street in Jared Lathrop's home town in Franklin, Pendleton County, West Virginia. Photo: Famartin

When a Degree Doesn’t Equal a ‘Good Job.’ Appalachian Youth Rethinking College

Heightened generational and cultural divides are increasingly apparent throughout Appalachia as rural students navigate the path to higher education. College has shifted from presenting a lure of opportunity to one of uncertainty and risk. To tell community members in a small Appalachian town to pull themselves up by their bootstraps […]

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