Revitalizing Rural: Using Place-Based Education Design to Revitalize Rural America

Leah Stoner // Adviser: Frances Temple-West

Revitalizing Rural: Using Place-Based Education Design to Revitalize Rural America

Ninety-seven percent of the U.S. is considered rural. Yet despite this majority, rural areas boast the highest rates of poverty, substance abuse, mental health problems, and teen pregnancy, and the lowest rates of education attainment. Nowhere is this more prevalent than in the rural region of Central Appalachia. Now the poorest area in America, this resource-rich region originally consisted of subsistence farmers but is now utterly impoverished due to the separation of the people from their land, the exploitation of the area's resources by outside corporate interests, and the deterioration of the education system due to school consolidation. Using the town of Stearns, Kentucky as a prototype, this thesis examines the impact of applying the principles of full-service, community schooling and place-based education to the field of design in a non-urban setting to combat poverty in rural regions.