[imgbelt img=ruralmatters.png]Our friends over at the Rural School and Community Trust will be releasing the 2009 version of “Why Rural Matters,” its 50-state analysis or rural schools. This is the fifth report in the “Why Rural Matters” series and will be the subject of a webinar to be held Wednesday. For full details, go here. The reports will help people judge how their states are doing when it comes to serving rural students. There’s quite a variety in outcomes, that’s for sure. For instance, the non-profit group reports that graduation rates for students in high schools with high levels of poverty range from 28% in Wyoming to over 90% in Nevada. In all, the report will measure states along 25 different indicators.In a preview to the report, the Rural School and Community Trust reports that several states have emerged with “pressing rural education concerns. Oregon, Nevada, Utah, Idaho, North Dakota, Colorado, Illinois, Ohio, New York, and Washington join several southern and southwestern states in facing crucial challenges related to rural educational policy and rural educational outcomes. California ranked high on indicators related to concentrated poverty and student and family diversity, as did Alaska, which had ranked high on diversity in 2007.”