Welcome to the first blog entry of the gotDIRT website. As you’ll see from perusing our webspace, our goal is to create a virtual teaching and learning center for rural educators to share resources, ideas, and/or to just connect with other professionals.

As a group we have been motivated by several things. First and foremost, we wanted to create a space that demonstrates that a democratic mindset (a commitment to inquiry, community, and personal responsibility) does not have to be compromised in a high-stakes, standards-based environment. Too often in public education today we are seeing schools that, in the name of passing the test, limit the educational experiences that are so important to prepare our children to be democratic citizens. Through this website we wanted to model that mandated curricular choices do not have to get in the way of practicing and encouraging a democratic way of living.

My role in this weekly blog is, hopefully, to invite interesting dialogue around democratic education in a rural environment. I am positive, as I am sure my students will agree, some weeks will be more interesting than others. However, I hope you will always feel free to join in the discussion and contribute your thoughts, insights, and/or resources as we create a virtual space for rural educators to explore important professional ideas with each other.

Some of the topics I want to explore in the blog are:

What does it mean to be rural?
What are the specific issues that are unique to teaching in a rural setting?
Is there such a thing as rural identity? If so, are there stages to rural identity? Is there a regional difference between these definitions of culture?
What evidence exists that addresses how rural/Appalachian culture influences teaching/learning?
What are possible solutions that have been proposed to address teaching/learning in a rural/Appalachian environment?
How is rural/Appalachian culture changing and/or shifting in this new technological/flat world?

Please, feel free to suggest other thoughts and questions that you would like to explore. Our vision is that this website becomes a virtual learning community where professionals meet to share and discuss ideas relevant to rural educators. So please, join us in the dialogue.

David M. Dees, Ph.D.
Kent State University Salem Campus

Tags: gotDIRT event, Salem Campus

This entry was posted on Monday, July 7th, 2008 at 9:13 am and is filed under events. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.