The Foundry: New (Rural) Perspectives on an Old Idea

Joel Garreau, in his 1981 book The Nine Nations of North America, outlines nine areas of "power and influence" with distinctive values and prospects that crossed political boundaries. His conceptualization of these economic and cultural regions of the continent reflected the modem era of industrialization and the rise of large cities that began after the Civil War and lasted for over 100 years. After 10 years, James Patterson and Peter Kim (1991) wrote The Day America Told the Truth, which identified further divisions shaped by the depletion of natural resources, the loss of manufacturing jobs to developing countries, the rise of the financial and service sectors of the economy, and the exodus of families from the cities to the suburbs. More than a decade later, Thomas Friedman, in his controversial book The Work' is Flat, suggested that further changes are being shaped by the twin forces of information technology and economic globalization at the dawn of the 21st century. For many years, the attention of policymakers, researchers, professionals, and the public as whole has been focused on the problems and possibilities of urban areas in the United States. Rural education leaders have decried the lack of rural-friendly policies, the dearth of rural research, and the ignorance about rural issues (Beeson & Strange, 2003; Sherwood, 2001). Today, however, there is growing interest in the challenges and opportunities faced by rural America, as evidenced by the creation of a bi-partisan group of representatives from the U. S. Senate and House known as the Rural Caucus, the implementation of the Rural Education Achievement Program (REAP), and the new study by the U. S. Department of Education's Institute of Education Science titled Status of Education in Rural America, published in Summer 2007. As part of this topical issue on the meaning of rural and its implications for rural education in today's world, this article examines the area Garreau characterized as "the Foundry" from a rural perspective.