This article explores the view of education from within central Appalachia. Although there has been an increase in educational attainment of high school graduation in Appalachia, the central subregion has a notably less percentages of people graduating than the northern and southern regions of Appalachia. This is vital information to know because this shows central Appalachia as an area that could use program interventions that could potentially help change the views of education in West Virginia and potentially help increase educational attainment. Currently central Appalachia are lagging behind other areas in high school as well as college educational attainment and in order to help better this community it is important to find programs that are able to connect with students in this area because it seems that these students may need more help than others to find purpose in education.

This article is helpful because it discusses the importance of adapting to local cultures in order to best meet local needs. This program decided that in order to best help the community they needed to adapt to the local values and norms and they were very aware of the regional disparities that sometimes prevent school systems from being able to fully serve their students in a way to set them up to succeed in their future education attainment. The authors researched the effects that traumatic stressors can have on Appalachian students and although they are already resilient, interventions can help improve development and their school performance showing that residents are responsive to interventions that adapt to their own cultures. After talking to teachers the authors found that there were improvements in teacher hopefulness about their students and in positively impacting challenging child behaviors. 

Mehra discussed the debilitating information poverty that is happening in Appalachia and how the low levels of information literacy as well as low graduation rates is contributing to the economic challenges of the region. There is also a lack of access to resources in their area and do not use IT as much as they think would be necessary. Their unique environmental circumstance is also credited to causing the low graduation rates. The lack of IT available for public school students can be helped by connecting them with local universities who would be able to allow greater access to resources without having to pay for these resources to be added to the school themselves as well. It can be a useful resource to elementary schoolers to be able to see other students who have graduated high school and have pursued higher education, and the resources that are available to them.

Kannapel and Flory included many graphs and statistics that we think will be helpful not only in our proposal but also to put on our website. These graphs include student characteristics, educational attainment, and a table of precious grants awarded to the Appalachian region. This information is vital for us to know as we are working closely to try and find ways to increase educational attainment and review what Innovation Grants have already gone through the Appalachian states and how they have impacted the surrounding communities based on the amounts awarded and the agency used. 

This article explores case studies that followed specific students and help the reader to understand the influence of their family on dedication to schooling. There were also students who were able to respond to the Clock Project used and how it impacted them positively. This is helpful because it is an example of a project that gave a positive impact on a community and it also allowed for us to see some of the struggles that students in Appalachia are facing, not just with resources but with environmental influences as well. These influences may make some of the students decide to go against their own passions in order to keep their families happy. This information is important for us to know as we try and bring a program to the community.

This article spoke about the deficits in education that the PARC has been trying to fight over the years. Hall states that over 22% of adults had fewer than five years of formal schooling. This statistic stands out and is important to our research because it shows that there may not be support for finishing education as it may not be a priority for families in the area. The article talked about the government trying to help increase education attainment but failing despite having the money believed to help.. Although there have been initiatives before to provide financing educational programs Hall says that much of central Appalachia lags behind.

In this article Hendrickson explores different reasons why there seems to be student resistance to schooling in rural Appalachia. The author feels that in order for the region to be successful then there needs to be a greater emphasis on education and educational attainment. Students who are asked to discuss and critically think about their resistance and what prevents them from being successful in school can feel that they have a voice and have shared some of their concerns. Some students felt that their families were not supportive of furthering education or do not have very much value on education in the way that they have it on other career paths. This has been something that has caused resistance in students and is helpful to a study of program intervention because it allows the mentors to know what barriers may be causing this lack of educational attainment.