The Challenges Rural Students Face After Admission

The federal government’s plan for expanding opportunity in rural America—to the extent there is one—seems to be trade school. Forget college, President Trump says. Build a workforce, and the jobs will come. To rural communities ravaged by restructuring and a public increasingly skeptical of a college degree, the message may sound enticing.

But trade schools alone will not erase the widening rural-urban wealth gap. A bachelor’s degree remains the surest path to the middle class. And rural youth deserve the same opportunities that nonrural youth have, including college.