As the civil rights movement progressed, ideas similar to “Equality! Where is it, if not in education? Equal rights! They cannot exist without equality of instruction” had been repetitively brought up, arguing one should be given access to education regardless of age, gender, religion, sexual orientation, and socioeconomic status. This goal remains today, as it has yet to be realized, especially in rural regions. However, governments and civilians have very different solutions to this quite complex problem. The concept of education equality is significantly limited if it only covers the scope of modern urban societies. Rural education must be considered just as important, yet the shortage of rural teachers around the globe is often overshadowed by mainstream events.

Challenges in Rural Education

Despite the limited media attention, the rural teacher turnover rate is rapidly rising. Teachers across the world have been complaining about job dissatisfaction and challenging work environments. As a result, many teachers have left the profession, and the effective distribution of education and coherency of curriculum has decreased. Meanwhile, high turnover rates are causing rural schools extra economic burdens due to increased expenses of continually having to hire new employees, harming students’ academic performance, and discouraging passionate educators. Rural schools suffer more seriously with staffing problems when faced with the adversity of increasing student enrollment and increased teacher retirement. Isolation, career mobility, and limited resources are all factors causing a higher turnover rate in rural areas as compared to urban areas.

Teacher Turnover Rate

Sweden, one of the wealthiest countries, announced that the difference between education demand and teacher supply has been predicted to continue to escalate until year 2035 only if prevention measures are followed. In 2019, approximately 20% of the teacher rural and urban workforces were empty. In Finland, in the year 2020, regardless of the higher prestige associated with the teaching profession in this country, a longitudinal survey discovered that 40-50% of teachers had the intention of leaving the field, in which 10-20% took the action already. In the United States, 30% of new teachers and 26% of teachers with 3-7 years of teaching experience left the profession in the 2022-2023 school year.  The same problem was prevalent in developing countries: a general 35% turnover rate in China.

Transfer Between Rural and Urban Settings

Not only is the overall turnover rate a concern, massive transfer of teachers from rural schools to urban schools is also sparking attention. In China, 71.56% of teachers in rural regions in 2019 had a desire to leave their jobs, intending to transfer to urban schools. The United States had a similar disproportion: between the years of 1999 to 2021, teachers in urban settings exhibited a 19% growth, whereas teachers in rural settings had a 5% decline. The shortage is affecting education quality on a global scale. As the supply of teachers decreased, rural schools often chose to hire more unqualified teachers, increase class sizes, and reduce the number of provided courses, disrupting school stability and student achievements.

Tracking of barriers

Researchers and politicians have hypothesized a variety of reasons for this phenomenon. All reasons pointed toward one direction: teacher discontentment, as 61% of rural teachers cited this as their main motive for departure.

Organizational

One of the most unexpected factors driving teacher discontentment and subsequent departure is the lack of classroom autonomy. Rather than being dissatisfied with salaries, 63% of rural teachers reported being unhappy with their school administration and 50% reported being unhappy with the lack of autonomy in designing and leading courses. While more freedom, it might worsen continuity and coherence with the curriculum, forcing teachers into a box is driving them away. Such paradox reveals a complex situation that requires intelligent and openminded compromise. A balance between liberty and liability shall be established through international legal protocols.

Social

Maintaining healthy relationships with colleagues and school administrators is compulsory due to the need for collaboration and interaction in the teaching profession. Researchers identified the strength of community ties as a foundation of retention, especially in providing an incentive to stay in rural schools. Job satisfaction positively correlates with one’s emotional involvement in the work environment and the relationships one builds, both of which can be improved through professional development workshops. Most rural schools have insufficient resources to support professional development that fosters supportive actions among colleagues while provoking crucial self-reflection and growth. Under these conditions, one of the quickest solutions would be to allocate additional funding to the rural education budgets so they can redesign training and offer collegial community-bonding programs.

Solutions

Because the loss of good teachers can intensively affect student achievement, rural areas need a multi-factor approach to this complex problem. Recruitment strategies alone will not solve the problem. The global dilemma can be solved with a systematic procedure that helps leaders adequately understand the reasons behind the high resignation rate.

Social contract reforms

When combating a common challenge, strategies should be transferable across geographical areas. Applications of psychology have proposed that helping rural teachers find a sense of belonging while reducing their emotional exhaustion might have an impact on their turnover rate.

Teacher Education Program Reforms

One of the most recent crises that has increased the turnover rate is the COVID-19 pandemic. The year-long school shutdown triggered teachers’ anxiety about job loss as reflected in the National Education Association 2022 poll response: 55% of educators showed intentions of leaving the profession earlier than planned. Sub-Saharan Africa, with 57.63% of the rural population, is currently in need of 15 million more teachers.

An innovative technique of combining the education program with an “earn-and-learn” approach was recently proposed by the American University as the Teacher Pipeline Program. In 2016. To receive scholarships, students majoring in education must undergo a career-oriented academic curriculum and transition to full-time teaching after graduation. New teachers are provided with mentorship and coaching in the first five years of their careers. This strategy targets education as a whole, allowing it to be transferred to other countries to help cope with rural teacher shortages at a larger scale. There were also long-term initiatives established in other countries with lower economic performance. Aula20, organized by Aseinc, is utilizing information technologies (IT) to enhance teachers' performance in rural Venezuela with a mission of building “a culture of peace in vulnerable schools”. Since 2010, the program has trained 3200 teachers and benefited 71,766 students.

Political Reform

Some countries have implemented appropriate legislative policies and systems to provide more support to teachers. Specifically, the state of Iowa founded the Teacher Leadership and Compensation System to reward high-performing teachers with leadership roles and decision-making rights, which effectively reduced the current organizational deficiency.

Furthermore, in 2022, The United Nations convened the Transforming Education Summit in response to this global education crisis. Statements of commitment were submitted by 143 member-state governments. Throughout recent years, this panel nominated 59 recommendations such as urging for governmental investment in the education sector to improve working conditions. As the most reputable international organization, its call to action is, without a doubt, a milestone of progression.

Reform suggestions specifically concerning the rural education division are not sufficient at this time, but most solutions and frameworks can be applied across continents, allowing them to be adapted in rural settings.