Erin McHenry-Sorber - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Papers by Erin McHenry-Sorber

Journal of Diversity in Higher Education

Peabody Journal of Education, Aug 2, 2023

Rural Sociology, May 15, 2023

This study investigated motivations for Appalachian medical students to stay or leave the region ... more This study investigated motivations for Appalachian medical students to stay or leave the region weighing postgraduation options. Semi‐structured interviews were employed with final year medical students. Transcripts were open‐coded and analyzed using the theoretical concept of Gemeinschaft/Gesellschaft. Participants were in continuous negotiation between notions of Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft in their decisions to stay or leave rural Appalachian communities. Students navigated multiple tensions in their decisions to stay or leave, including: (1) geographic isolation versus place identity and (2) community responsibility versus individual opportunity. Utilization of Gemeinschaft/Gesellschaft provides a novel contribution to the literature on decisions to stay or leave as the majority of participants hedged in their decision‐making regarding future practice location. These students tended to employ a Gesellschaft rationale to stay and a Gemeinschaft rationale to leave, expressing complicated ideas about community and individual opportunity.

Proceedings of the 2020 AERA Annual Meeting, 2020

Medical science educator, Jul 27, 2016

Peabody Journal of Education

Proceedings of the 2021 AERA Annual Meeting

Journal of Research in Rural Education, 2018

Proceedings of the 2020 AERA Annual Meeting

University of Maine, 333 Merrill Hall, Orono, ME 04469 (catharine.biddle@maine.edu). The Journal ... more University of Maine, 333 Merrill Hall, Orono, ME 04469 (catharine.biddle@maine.edu). The Journal of Research in Rural Education is published by the Center on Rural Education and Communities, College of Education, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802. ISSN 1551-0670 reevaluate the constructs of our fi eld: What constitutes rural education research? What ought it be? In this theoretical essay, we critically reexamine a piece of rural education scholarship that has become an important standard for judging rural salience, Coladarci’s (2007) “Improving the Yield of Rural Education Research: An Editor’s Swan Song.” Written at the end of his tenure as editor of the Journal of Research in Rural Education over a decade ago, Coladarci laid out a handful of carefully explained standards for how to evaluate and enhance the unique quality of rural education research. These standards included, among other recommendations, the request that authors of rural education scholarship “make the rural argument,” or justify why rurality is theoretically relevant to their study with the goal of more carefully understanding what happens at the intersection of rurality and schooling. It is a piece that has been used to introduce newcomers to the fi eld of rural education research, and it is cited as a reference in the submission guidelines for the Journal of Research in Rural Education. As such, it has signifi cantly shaped the rural education research community over the last 10 years. We position Coladarci’s (2007) article as a powerful recent example of boundary work in our fi eld. As scientifi c research is a social endeavor, research communities must coalesce around a series of norms that help to defi ne the In 1983, Massey and Crosby argued that rural communities are “invisible,” stating, “Rural residents are far more likely to suff er in silence than demand attention from the agencies and institutions ostensibly designed to serve them” (p. 266). However, in the wake of the 2016 U.S. election, rural America has been thrust into the spotlight, with the critical importance of better understanding the circumstances of rural communities recognized by both national media and the broader fi eld of social science research (Black, 2017; Bottemiller Evich 2016; Cramer, 2016; Kurtzleben, 2016; Monnat & Brown, 2017). As rural education research scholars, we are as aff ected by this sudden attention as other rural social scientists are. It is our “boomtown” moment in which some out-of-fi eld scholars are rushing in to study this “under-researched fi eld,” while the lifetime residents seek to hold on to our boundaries and make clear our core assumptions. Now is the time to This theoretical essay critically examines the impact of Coladarci’s 2007 article, “Improving the Yield of Rural Education Research: An Editor’s Swan Song,” which he composed at the conclusion of his tenure as editor of the Journal of Research in Rural Education. Using boundary theory and “awayness” as a metaphor for understanding community in social science research, we use citation analysis to review the ways in which Coladarci’s work has been taken up by the fi eld, illustrating the ways in which this piece serves to socialize new researchers to rural education research. We then take up Coladarci’s invitation to further discuss what might defi ne a contribution to the fi eld of rural education scholarship and propose several additional considerations, including analyses of how power manifests across space and the criticality of a topic to rural schools and communities. Citation: Biddle, C., Sutherland, D.H., & McHenry-Sorber, E. (2019). On resisting “awayness” and being a good insider: Early career scholars revisit Coladarci’s swan song a decade later. Journal of Research in Rural Education, 35(7), 1-16. Retrieved from: https://doi.org/10.26209/jrre3507 Catharine Biddle University of Maine

The Rural Educator

Rural communities in the Southern US are shaped by a legacy of racial oppression carried out thro... more Rural communities in the Southern US are shaped by a legacy of racial oppression carried out through educational systems, in tandem with contemporary policies that perpetuate the marginalization of minoritized students. In this qualitative, revelatory case study, we examine the experiences of rural, southern school leaders who are tasked with ensuring educational equity. Using critical place-based leadership and bonding/bridging theory, we examine the social construction of belonging in a rural southern community, and the implications for equity-centered educational leadership. We find the community maintains tight-knit bonding capital that is rooted in land ownership and racial exclusion, which is conceptualized as southernness. Educational leaders who develop bridging capital were best positioned to shift community perceptions necessary to enact educational equity.

The Rural Educator

TRE editor Erin McHenry-Sorber recently spoke with three of the authors of the biennial report on... more TRE editor Erin McHenry-Sorber recently spoke with three of the authors of the biennial report on the status of rural education published by the Rural School and Community Trust in partnership with the College Board and AASA: The School Superintendents’ Organization. Why Rural Matters 2018-2019 The Time is Now examines the state of rural education in each of the 50 states in the United States. The authors describe the significance of the report and its implications for policy and practice.

The Bloomsbury Handbook of Rural Education in the United States, 2021

Journal of Research in Rural Education, 2018

Recent sociological research has highlighted myriad social and economic challenges that require r... more Recent sociological research has highlighted myriad social and economic challenges that require rural superintendents to critique internal spaces of oppression and exclusion. This body of scholarship illustrates the need for a revised conception of the rural superintendency as a position responsive to external infl uences, while simultaneously attuned to within-community spaces of marginalization and inequity. Inattention to these intra-community spaces of marginalization threatens the utility of a critical placeconscious framework for leadership (Nespor, 2008). In this conceptual article, we identify constructs for understanding the work of rural educational leaders in two iterations, or waves, of literature since the 1960s: (1) insider/ outsider and (2) place-conscious/critical place-conscious. We interrogate a focused set of publications that have driven or researched in practice these constructs. We fi nd that the second wave-place-conscious/critical place-consciousis largely prescriptive, and recent research attempting to use critical place-conscious leadership, coupled with literature on rural community change and broader superintendent scholarship, has exposed weaknesses in the model. Thus, we argue for a revised model of critical place-conscious leadership that better addresses the heterogeneity within rural communities, the rapidly changing context of rural communities, and the realities of contemporary practicalities of the professionalized rural superintendent. Methods This conceptual article was borne from conversations between us as we considered our own research and practice

The Rural Educator, 2020

This issue's policy brief suggests that it is important to evaluate election candidates' ... more This issue's policy brief suggests that it is important to evaluate election candidates' platforms and views about rural education and rural communities.

Energy companies and proponents of unconventional natural gas development have long touted the po... more Energy companies and proponents of unconventional natural gas development have long touted the potential economic benefits to local communities (Hudgins and Poole 2014). Local communities have often shown a propensity to support shale gas development because of the potential for economic growth, despite the risk of negative social and environmental outcomes (Anderson and Theodori 2009; Ceresola and Crowe 2015; Schafft, Borlu, and Glenna 2013; Theodori 2009). This was the case in Pennsylvania as unconventional shale gas development began in earnest in the mid 2000s, an industrial activity strongly embraced by then-governor Tom Corbett and others within the state legislature (Pifer 2011; Waples 2012).However, residents within many areas experiencing boomtown natural resource development in Pennsylvania and elsewhere, have not always received the degree of economic benefit initially anticipated (James and Aadland 2011; Little and Lovejoy 1979; Ward, Polson, and Price 2014). The oil and...

Educational Administration Quarterly, 2021

Purpose: Schools across the predominately rural state of West Virginia are experiencing widesprea... more Purpose: Schools across the predominately rural state of West Virginia are experiencing widespread teacher shortages, though recruitment and retention difficulties are unevenly distributed across place. Using spatial in/justice as our framework, we explore how principals define place, how place influences principal perceptions of teacher recruitment and retention, and how principals respond to these staffing challenges given their leadership experiences, relationship to school community, and understandings of place affordances and disadvantages. Research Methods/Approach This research utilized interviews with eight principals across six school districts in West Virginia over a four-month time frame. We inductively coded interview transcripts in iterative cycles using our research framework as a guide for emic and etic codes. Findings: We find principals’ understanding of place influences on staffing to be specific to the unique attributes of each community and the placement of their...

The Rural Educator, 2021

In 2018, West Virginia teachers staged a statewide strike which lasted almost two weeks and inclu... more In 2018, West Virginia teachers staged a statewide strike which lasted almost two weeks and included schools across all 55 countywide districts. The main reported strike issues for West Virginia teachers included cuts to their healthcare coverage by the state and relatively low salaries. Prior to the strike, West Virginia teachers ranked 48th in the nation in terms of pay. The West Virginia strike sparked a year-long wave of teacher labor protests across the country, in both predominately rural states and large urban centers. In 2019, West Virginia teachers went on strike again, bringing the movement full circle. In November, 2020, I interviewed Jay O’Neal and Sam Nelson, two teachers involved in the 2018 statewide teachers strike in West Virginia for the National Rural Education Association’s Annual Conference and Research Symposium. Jay O’Neal originated the Facebook page in 2017 that served as the hub for organizing activity prior to and during the 2018 strike. O’Neal is a middle...

Journal of Diversity in Higher Education

Peabody Journal of Education, Aug 2, 2023

Rural Sociology, May 15, 2023

This study investigated motivations for Appalachian medical students to stay or leave the region ... more This study investigated motivations for Appalachian medical students to stay or leave the region weighing postgraduation options. Semi‐structured interviews were employed with final year medical students. Transcripts were open‐coded and analyzed using the theoretical concept of Gemeinschaft/Gesellschaft. Participants were in continuous negotiation between notions of Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft in their decisions to stay or leave rural Appalachian communities. Students navigated multiple tensions in their decisions to stay or leave, including: (1) geographic isolation versus place identity and (2) community responsibility versus individual opportunity. Utilization of Gemeinschaft/Gesellschaft provides a novel contribution to the literature on decisions to stay or leave as the majority of participants hedged in their decision‐making regarding future practice location. These students tended to employ a Gesellschaft rationale to stay and a Gemeinschaft rationale to leave, expressing complicated ideas about community and individual opportunity.

Proceedings of the 2020 AERA Annual Meeting, 2020

Medical science educator, Jul 27, 2016

Peabody Journal of Education

Proceedings of the 2021 AERA Annual Meeting

Journal of Research in Rural Education, 2018

Proceedings of the 2020 AERA Annual Meeting

University of Maine, 333 Merrill Hall, Orono, ME 04469 (catharine.biddle@maine.edu). The Journal ... more University of Maine, 333 Merrill Hall, Orono, ME 04469 (catharine.biddle@maine.edu). The Journal of Research in Rural Education is published by the Center on Rural Education and Communities, College of Education, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802. ISSN 1551-0670 reevaluate the constructs of our fi eld: What constitutes rural education research? What ought it be? In this theoretical essay, we critically reexamine a piece of rural education scholarship that has become an important standard for judging rural salience, Coladarci’s (2007) “Improving the Yield of Rural Education Research: An Editor’s Swan Song.” Written at the end of his tenure as editor of the Journal of Research in Rural Education over a decade ago, Coladarci laid out a handful of carefully explained standards for how to evaluate and enhance the unique quality of rural education research. These standards included, among other recommendations, the request that authors of rural education scholarship “make the rural argument,” or justify why rurality is theoretically relevant to their study with the goal of more carefully understanding what happens at the intersection of rurality and schooling. It is a piece that has been used to introduce newcomers to the fi eld of rural education research, and it is cited as a reference in the submission guidelines for the Journal of Research in Rural Education. As such, it has signifi cantly shaped the rural education research community over the last 10 years. We position Coladarci’s (2007) article as a powerful recent example of boundary work in our fi eld. As scientifi c research is a social endeavor, research communities must coalesce around a series of norms that help to defi ne the In 1983, Massey and Crosby argued that rural communities are “invisible,” stating, “Rural residents are far more likely to suff er in silence than demand attention from the agencies and institutions ostensibly designed to serve them” (p. 266). However, in the wake of the 2016 U.S. election, rural America has been thrust into the spotlight, with the critical importance of better understanding the circumstances of rural communities recognized by both national media and the broader fi eld of social science research (Black, 2017; Bottemiller Evich 2016; Cramer, 2016; Kurtzleben, 2016; Monnat & Brown, 2017). As rural education research scholars, we are as aff ected by this sudden attention as other rural social scientists are. It is our “boomtown” moment in which some out-of-fi eld scholars are rushing in to study this “under-researched fi eld,” while the lifetime residents seek to hold on to our boundaries and make clear our core assumptions. Now is the time to This theoretical essay critically examines the impact of Coladarci’s 2007 article, “Improving the Yield of Rural Education Research: An Editor’s Swan Song,” which he composed at the conclusion of his tenure as editor of the Journal of Research in Rural Education. Using boundary theory and “awayness” as a metaphor for understanding community in social science research, we use citation analysis to review the ways in which Coladarci’s work has been taken up by the fi eld, illustrating the ways in which this piece serves to socialize new researchers to rural education research. We then take up Coladarci’s invitation to further discuss what might defi ne a contribution to the fi eld of rural education scholarship and propose several additional considerations, including analyses of how power manifests across space and the criticality of a topic to rural schools and communities. Citation: Biddle, C., Sutherland, D.H., & McHenry-Sorber, E. (2019). On resisting “awayness” and being a good insider: Early career scholars revisit Coladarci’s swan song a decade later. Journal of Research in Rural Education, 35(7), 1-16. Retrieved from: https://doi.org/10.26209/jrre3507 Catharine Biddle University of Maine

The Rural Educator

Rural communities in the Southern US are shaped by a legacy of racial oppression carried out thro... more Rural communities in the Southern US are shaped by a legacy of racial oppression carried out through educational systems, in tandem with contemporary policies that perpetuate the marginalization of minoritized students. In this qualitative, revelatory case study, we examine the experiences of rural, southern school leaders who are tasked with ensuring educational equity. Using critical place-based leadership and bonding/bridging theory, we examine the social construction of belonging in a rural southern community, and the implications for equity-centered educational leadership. We find the community maintains tight-knit bonding capital that is rooted in land ownership and racial exclusion, which is conceptualized as southernness. Educational leaders who develop bridging capital were best positioned to shift community perceptions necessary to enact educational equity.

The Rural Educator

TRE editor Erin McHenry-Sorber recently spoke with three of the authors of the biennial report on... more TRE editor Erin McHenry-Sorber recently spoke with three of the authors of the biennial report on the status of rural education published by the Rural School and Community Trust in partnership with the College Board and AASA: The School Superintendents’ Organization. Why Rural Matters 2018-2019 The Time is Now examines the state of rural education in each of the 50 states in the United States. The authors describe the significance of the report and its implications for policy and practice.

The Bloomsbury Handbook of Rural Education in the United States, 2021

Journal of Research in Rural Education, 2018

Recent sociological research has highlighted myriad social and economic challenges that require r... more Recent sociological research has highlighted myriad social and economic challenges that require rural superintendents to critique internal spaces of oppression and exclusion. This body of scholarship illustrates the need for a revised conception of the rural superintendency as a position responsive to external infl uences, while simultaneously attuned to within-community spaces of marginalization and inequity. Inattention to these intra-community spaces of marginalization threatens the utility of a critical placeconscious framework for leadership (Nespor, 2008). In this conceptual article, we identify constructs for understanding the work of rural educational leaders in two iterations, or waves, of literature since the 1960s: (1) insider/ outsider and (2) place-conscious/critical place-conscious. We interrogate a focused set of publications that have driven or researched in practice these constructs. We fi nd that the second wave-place-conscious/critical place-consciousis largely prescriptive, and recent research attempting to use critical place-conscious leadership, coupled with literature on rural community change and broader superintendent scholarship, has exposed weaknesses in the model. Thus, we argue for a revised model of critical place-conscious leadership that better addresses the heterogeneity within rural communities, the rapidly changing context of rural communities, and the realities of contemporary practicalities of the professionalized rural superintendent. Methods This conceptual article was borne from conversations between us as we considered our own research and practice

The Rural Educator, 2020

This issue's policy brief suggests that it is important to evaluate election candidates' ... more This issue's policy brief suggests that it is important to evaluate election candidates' platforms and views about rural education and rural communities.

Energy companies and proponents of unconventional natural gas development have long touted the po... more Energy companies and proponents of unconventional natural gas development have long touted the potential economic benefits to local communities (Hudgins and Poole 2014). Local communities have often shown a propensity to support shale gas development because of the potential for economic growth, despite the risk of negative social and environmental outcomes (Anderson and Theodori 2009; Ceresola and Crowe 2015; Schafft, Borlu, and Glenna 2013; Theodori 2009). This was the case in Pennsylvania as unconventional shale gas development began in earnest in the mid 2000s, an industrial activity strongly embraced by then-governor Tom Corbett and others within the state legislature (Pifer 2011; Waples 2012).However, residents within many areas experiencing boomtown natural resource development in Pennsylvania and elsewhere, have not always received the degree of economic benefit initially anticipated (James and Aadland 2011; Little and Lovejoy 1979; Ward, Polson, and Price 2014). The oil and...

Educational Administration Quarterly, 2021

Purpose: Schools across the predominately rural state of West Virginia are experiencing widesprea... more Purpose: Schools across the predominately rural state of West Virginia are experiencing widespread teacher shortages, though recruitment and retention difficulties are unevenly distributed across place. Using spatial in/justice as our framework, we explore how principals define place, how place influences principal perceptions of teacher recruitment and retention, and how principals respond to these staffing challenges given their leadership experiences, relationship to school community, and understandings of place affordances and disadvantages. Research Methods/Approach This research utilized interviews with eight principals across six school districts in West Virginia over a four-month time frame. We inductively coded interview transcripts in iterative cycles using our research framework as a guide for emic and etic codes. Findings: We find principals’ understanding of place influences on staffing to be specific to the unique attributes of each community and the placement of their...

The Rural Educator, 2021

In 2018, West Virginia teachers staged a statewide strike which lasted almost two weeks and inclu... more In 2018, West Virginia teachers staged a statewide strike which lasted almost two weeks and included schools across all 55 countywide districts. The main reported strike issues for West Virginia teachers included cuts to their healthcare coverage by the state and relatively low salaries. Prior to the strike, West Virginia teachers ranked 48th in the nation in terms of pay. The West Virginia strike sparked a year-long wave of teacher labor protests across the country, in both predominately rural states and large urban centers. In 2019, West Virginia teachers went on strike again, bringing the movement full circle. In November, 2020, I interviewed Jay O’Neal and Sam Nelson, two teachers involved in the 2018 statewide teachers strike in West Virginia for the National Rural Education Association’s Annual Conference and Research Symposium. Jay O’Neal originated the Facebook page in 2017 that served as the hub for organizing activity prior to and during the 2018 strike. O’Neal is a middle...