ERNIC Network Meetings: An Exemplary Case of Rural Learning at the Boundary (Poster 3)

• In Event: Friday Poster Session 4:55
  In Invited Poster Session: 2024 AERA Undergraduate Fellows Research Poster Fair

Abstract

This case study examines the efforts of the Eastern Ridge Network Improvement Community (ERNIC), which was formed by a county office of education of a large state with eight rural districts and two external partners —a CI coach and mathematics professor— to improve K-5 mathematics instruction. The partnership met quarterly, collaborating through day-long events, or Network Meetings, attended by county, district, and school leaders, teachers, and external partners. From field observations and interviews with stakeholders, this study analyzes how the partnership’s quarterly meetings made various stakeholders’ expertise visible through district showcases, mathematics and improvement science activities, collaborative instructional design sessions, and collective data analysis discussions. By structuring multiple collaborative contexts for ERNIC members to interact with research-based ideas, the meetings served as boundary practice supporting their uptake. These activities were also distinctly cited in interviews as beneficial in combatting rural professional isolation. I find the meetings are an exemplary case study of a boundary practice bridging research and practice for rural districts, an area of policy underrepresented in the greater research landscape and worthy of further study.

Author

• Spencer Cook, Northwestern University