S04E03 – Understanding New Teacher Expectations in Rural America from Retention to Practice. An Interview with Dr. Casey Jakubowski.

We interviewed Dr. Casey Jakubowski about teacher retention, policy, and practice. Dr. Jakubowski shared that Appalachia extends into New York State, and we reflected on how New York has large rural communities. Much of Dr. Jakubowski's work has focused on these communities and beyond (including West Virginia). We discuss the changing trends of job availability to applicants. We discuss burnout of new rural teachers and pay disparities between urban versus suburban teaching. The revolving door of teachers causes students not to have a permeance of personalities and connections with teachers. Interpersonal relationships between teachers and students are important to student success. We discussed some common issues facing rural education, including internet access and lack of amenities such as Starbucks as a cultural expectation of new teachers. One solution noted by Dr. Jakubowski is for rural districts to partner to address the unique challenges in rural education. We shift to discuss the rural funding in New York State. Dr. Jakubowski shares that given this perceived decrease in the number of kids in rural education states, such as New York, are starting to cut budgets for rural education. This has a direct impact on programs and teachers in these schools. We discuss how teachers hold significant responsibility for the welfare of their communities, families, and students to help students succeed. Finally, Dr. Jakubowski discusses place-based teaching as a solution to give resources to rural teaching. This helps facilitate partnerships between the teachers and the community to help students see how their education is connected to their community. These can be connected to science, history, math, and other topics. Further, he suggests we should celebrate other educational programs such as the Scouts of America, 4-H, and other programs that assist in preparing students for leadership and the workforce.
Check out Dr. Jakubowski's book Getting to the Hearts of Teaching, as some of the topics discussed come from this book.

Casey Jakubowski Phd founder of Dragontamer.us is the author of books on Rural Education and the teacher retention crisis. Thinking about Teaching, A cog in the machine, ang Getting to the Hearts of Teaching(EduMatch Publishing) are rural inspired and rural focused. He is the co author of Crush it from the start: 50 tips for new teachers (SchoolRubric) designed to help the educator retention crisis. A historian,,Casey wrote Rural Education history: state policy meets local implementation (Lexington) that delves into the failed school consolidation policies. His book, Minerva Conflict in the hills (Lexington) examines the history of the Post World War II centralization policy towards education.

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