What Works?

Many factors influence a student’s success in life. Social-emotional wellbeing, quality of education, and available opportunities are key factors that influence life outcomes for students. Learn about the research behind these factors, how they play a role in the lives of rural students, and what resources can help you improve the lives of students in your community. You may be surprised to find out how you can utilize the resources in your rural community to improve the lives of students! 

Learn more about how this research is being implemented across Colorado, and access the programs and tools developed by rural communities here. 

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Providing students with social-emotional support results in higher academic performance (Institute for Student Achievement, 2006).  

Being connected to a caring adult is the #1 protective factor in preventing at-risk behaviors (Search Institute, n.d.).  

Social connections significantly impact career success and satisfaction (Wolff & Moser, 2009). 

Health and Wellness

Mental wellness is central to a successful educational experience that prepares rural students for life after high school. Schools—where children spend most of their waking hours—often recognize that addressing a student’s mental health and social emotional needs leads to better outcomes. Students are healthier, happier, and more likely to succeed when the needs of the whole child are addressed.  

Advising

To prepare students for success after school, schools need to provide support for both academic and social-emotional learning. Advising plays an important role in creating an integrated system that considers the whole child through social-emotional learning (SEL), academic support, mentorships, and other programs. Finding the right approach to advising is often a challenge for rural schools with limited resources and staff. Here you will find resources and tools related to advising in the rural context.  

Guidance 

Having an effective system of support and guidance for students is essential to ensuring students are given all the tools necessary to be successful in school. Most guidance systems require tremendous amounts of resources, time, and capacity that rural schools often lack. The Distributive Guidance model is an approach to advising and guidance systems that takes rural resource scarcity into consideration. It tackles issues relevant to rural communities, such as mental health. Distributed guidance can be employed as a peer support program to reduce suicide risk.

Data shows that rural schools are in dire need of systems that will train teachers to identify students who are at higher risk of suicide and that will give students the social and emotional skills necessary to self-regulate and form positive relationships and support groups (Murphy, 2014). Supporting the whole child is essential to ensuring rural students thrive in school and can transition successfully to college and/or career.  

What does the research say about Distributed Guidance?

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Academic & Career Planning

Guidance  

Having an effective system of support and guidance for students is essential to ensuring students are given all the tools necessary to be successful in school. Most guidance systems require tremendous amounts of resources, time, and capacity that rural schools often lack. The Distributive Guidance model is an approach to advising and guidance systems that takes rural resource scarcity into consideration. It tackles issues relevant to rural communities, such as mental health. Distributed guidance can be employed as a peer support program to reduce suicide risk.

Data shows that rural schools are in dire need of systems that will train teachers to identify students who are at higher risk of suicide and that will give students the social and emotional skills necessary to self-regulate and form positive relationships and support groups (Murphy, 2014). Supporting the whole child is essential to ensuring rural students thrive in school and can transition successfully to college and/or career.  

What does the research say about Distributed Guidance?

Academic and career planning are essential components of a quality educational experience that help students transition into their post-secondary lives. Rural students are less likely than urban students to attend college, but once enrolled, they are equally as likely to graduate (Guiffrida, 2008). To ensure successful school to work transitions, rural students need support exploring, planning, and pursuing their academic and career interests. Rural students also tend to attend different types of colleges compared to students from urban areas. Learn more about the research and how to prepare rural students for college.

  • Since 2009, both legislative and policy efforts in Colorado have supported ensuring that every high school student and, ideally, every middle school student in the state has their own career and academic plan. ICAP (Individualized Career & Academic Planning) is a research-based, multi-year, developmentally appropriate process designed to support secondary students in their transition to adulthood. The goal of ICAP is to ensure every student receives the support needed to make a successful post-secondary transition. Learn more about the ICAP process.  

  • Otero Junior College offers resources and information on financial aid and scholarships.  

  • College Approach is a college tutoring service that assists first-generation and low-income students through the college application and admission process. Services are free and their highly-qualified tutors have helped students achieve better outcomes with college admissions and financial aid. 

  • My Colorado Journey, previously Colleges in Colorado, was initiated by the Department of Higher Education to serve the citizens of the State of Colorado by promoting access to, affordability of, and success in higher education and training for all students. Coloradans can use the platform to explore career and education pathways, break down barriers to post-secondary attainment, and create a plan for their postsecondary and workforce success.  

  • Portrait of a Graduate is a locally developed, but globally positioned vision that serves as a north star for system transformation. It provides strategic direction for the redesign of the overall educational experience for students, and its collective vision reinvigorates and re-engages students, teachers, and community stakeholders.  

  • Talent Found is a website that allows you to explore career pathways, develop skills, and connect with employers.  

  • YouScience offers tools and assessments to guide students to make career and life choices that are best for them.  

  • Local Workforce Centers offers local networking opportunities, resources for finding jobs and improving your resume, as well as local career development trainings.  

  • The Ogallala Commons offers entrepreneurship fairs, apprenticeships, internships, coaching, and youth engagement opportunities. 

  • The Colorado Department of Labor and Employment provides information on what job sectors are growing, who is hiring across the state, as well as opportunities to develop skills. 

Guidance

Having an effective system of support and guidance for students is essential to ensuring students are given all the tools necessary to be successful in school. Most guidance systems require tremendous amount of resources, time, and capacity that rural schools often lack. The Distributive Guidance model is an approach to advising and guidance systems that takes rural resources scarcity in rural into consideration. It tackles issues relevant to rural communities, such as mental health. Distributed guidance can be employed as a peer support program to reduce suicide risk.

Data shows that rural schools are in dire need of systems that will train teachers to identify students who are at higher risk of suicide and that will give students the social and emotional skills necessary to self-regulate and form positive relationships and support groups (Murphy, 2014).  

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Life Ready Skills

Work-Based Learning

Work-Based Learning (WBL) combines traditional classroom instruction with exposure to work in a student’s desired field and/or career path. WBL allows students to explore careers they may want to pursue after they graduate and develop the skill sets they need in the workforce, ultimately preparing them to enter the workforce.  

 

Career Exposure

School to Work offers students exposure to opportunities that allow them to build technical skills in their local communities. Exposure includes entrepreneurship education, internships, career exploration, and other hands-on work experiences. This provides students with career experiences and real-world based learning that prepares them for the workforce.  

 

Skills Building

Skill building is about increasing the skills students need to thrive after they leave school. Research shows that students need a combination of technical, interpersonal, and social skills to transition from school to the workplace and/or college. Research also shows that skill building leads to better opportunities for students and higher earnings overall.

Here you will find resources on how schools can build in students different skill sets, including essential skills—such as communication and collaboration—, technical skills, management skills, and leadership skills.  

 

Rural Mentorship

Mentorship programs can drastically improve sense of belonging, academic performance, and social and emotional well-being among participants (both students and their mentors). Research indicates that “youth involved in high-quality, secure relationships are more independent, more persistent and more socially competent” than their peers who did not have access to these stable adult relationships (Herrera, Grossman, Kauh, & McMaken, 2011).

Creating a mentorship program seems like a significant undertaking, but according to research conducted by the Child Trends Research Brief, it is well worth it as: 

  • Youth participating in mentoring relationships experience better attendance rates, have a higher chance of reaching higher levels of education, and have better attitudes towards schools.  

  • Mentored students are 46% less likely to initiate drug use while being mentored than similar students in a control group. 

  • Mentored youth were more likely to have positive social attitudes and relationships. Participating youth reported feeling that they trusted their parents more and were able to communicate better with adults. They also reported having more positive and emotionally supportive friend groups compared to their experiences before being mentored.  

To assist with the creation of rural youth mentoring programs, the Youth Collaboratory created a Rural Mentoring Toolkit that addresses the strengths and challenges rural communities face when creating a mentorship program. This toolkit also provides research and resources to help school leaders understand what mentorship can look like in their community and what they can do to create a strong program.  

 

School to Work Curriculum

Street Smarts Program

The purpose of the Street Smarts Program is to have an experience designed exclusively for high school juniors and seniors that will connect motivated students with exciting professional internships that help prepare students for post-high school studies and long-lasting careers. The Smarts Program provides professional mentoring internships in local business settings to enhance students’ grasp of the business world.  

For access to the Street Smarts curriculum, please contact Jennifer Nesselhuf. 

 

LIFT Program

This multi-week program teaches youth the importance of integrity and ethics and how both of those concepts affect them right now and in their futures. The workshop and project-based learning curriculum offers an introduction to business ethics as well as personal character lessons. These lessons focus on topics like responsibility, character, values, and development, and the program concludes with each student presenting their project and signing the LIFT Commitment to Conduct. 

LIFT Curriculum Materials:  

 

Life Ready Skills

The following is a list of School to Work resources to support the development of life ready skills of rural students in Colorado.