How does the Colorado Department of Education (CDE) define a rural school district?
A Colorado school district is determined to be rural giving consideration to the size of the district, the distance from the nearest large urban/urbanized area, and having a student enrollment of approximately 6,050 students or less. Small rural districts are those districts meeting these same criteria and having a student population of less than 1,000 students.
Rural schools and communities have very different needs than large, urbanized school districts, including funding disparities; transportation needs over long distances; access to technology; teacher recruitment; migrant families; and more. Some of the CDE resources available from our library that discuss the unique challenges and opportunities found in rural school districts include:
- A Rural Needs Study: Improving CDE Services to Rural School Districts (2011)
- Blended Learning in Rural Colorado: Status and Strategies for Expansion (2012)
- Colorado Migrant Identification & Recruitment Guidebook (2012)
- Exploring the Potential Impact of the “Colorado Healthy Human Capital Self-Assessment” in Rural Districts (2012)
- Flexibility for Rural Schools and Districts on Unified Improvement Planning and READ Act (2014)
- Gifted Education in Rural and Small Districts (2009)
- Rural Education Achievement Program (REAP) (webpage)
- Rural Education Council Purpose and Agreements (2017)
- Small Rural District Funding (2015)
You can find a current list of Colorado’s rural and small rural districts here.
Search our library’s online catalog for more resources, including historical reports on rural schools.
Former Technical Services Librarian at State Publications Library
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