Idaho’S Rural Schools Need Help, Report Says Declining Enrollment Reflects Trend Across Nation

Idaho ranks second in the nation in the percentage of rural schools with declining enrollments and is in grave need of a better plan for rural education.

Those findings are included in a report on the nation’s rural schools released Tuesday by the nonprofit Rural School and Community Trust, which works with more than 700 rural kindergarten through 12th-grade schools in 35 states.

The national debate on school quality isn’t addressing the problem in rural America, the group contends.

“This is a wake-up call about rural education in America,” said spokeswoman Kathy Westra. “You hear about schools in New York, Chicago and Boston.”

One-quarter of the nation’s 53 million students attend schools in towns of 25,000 or less, which are considered rural.

Idaho’s challenge stems from its sparse population - the state ranks second nationally in percentage of children attending rural schools.

Declining rural enrollment means fewer dollars.

“It’s affecting our district quite significantly,” said Superintendent Greg Godwin of the Kellogg Joint School District. “As a result, over the years we have reduced staff a great deal.”

It’s a problem found throughout the Silver Valley, where a loss of mining and timber industry jobs is forcing parents to flee in search of work.

Besides high unemployment, these districts are also losing federal cash that comes from timber sales. In the Wallace School District, for example, the federal money used for building maintenance decreased more than 50 percent last year - to $90,000 from the usual $200,000 a year.

The schools manage to survive by not filling vacant teaching spots and cutting extracurricular activities.

And the districts depend on rural residents - also hurt by declining timber harvests - to pay higher taxes to keep the schools open.

So far, voters have been supportive of these supplemental levies, but Godwin and other superintendents fear they may eventually have to cut more programs.

“I don’t believe it has gotten to that level at this time because of supplemental support,” said Superintendent Reid Straabe of the Wallace district. “But if we don’t have that, it’s personnel and then programs” that are cut.

Straabe is the former Boundary County superintendent. He said schools there have the same problem with declining enrollment.

“Because of these factors, we see the need for a rural school policy in Idaho as critical,” said Marty Strange, a policy director for the Rural Trust.

Superintendents Godwin and Straabe agree the Idaho Legislature should try to bring industry back to these rural communities and ensure adequate teacher salaries so the districts don’t lose staff to higher paying areas.

The national report rated 13 states as having “critical” need to improve, 12 as “serious” and 13 as “fair.”

The report was released as Education Secretary Richard Riley visited schools in the Mississippi Delta region, trying to focus national attention on rural education.

Eight southern states and the Dakotas lead the report’s list of troubled rural K-12 public education, with Idaho just a notch better.

Education Department officials circulated the group’s report and praised the work that drew heavily from department data.

The report ranked the states based on factors such as teacher pay and state spending, as well as the income and education of parents. The study did not include any assessment of students’ academic achievements, such as test scores and grades.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.