Calvin Lunsford Beale was born in Washington, DC, on June 6, 1923, and passed away at age 85 on September 2, 2008. He was a city boy born and bred, and while he "never wanted to live in a rural area" he became one of the most astute observers of rural America in the latter half of the twentieth century. Calvin spent the majority of his…

Conducting evaluations that are both valid and ethical is imperative for the support and sustainability of programs that address underserved and vulnerable populations. A key component is to have evaluators who are knowledgeable about relevant cultural issues and sensitive to population needs. Hispanics in rural settings are vulnerable for many…

With increasing national and regional emphasis on serving the needs of rural people, especially migrants and farmworkers, increased effort was expended to provide services as effectively as possible. Problems remain, however, in clearly identifying and tallying these services so that efforts to provide equal access can reach all of the rural…

Children working in agriculture have always been a part of the rural culture and work ethos of the United States, especially on the Great Plains. Many teenagers still detassel corn or walk the beans in the summer months to earn spending money or money for college. But what about the children who work as migrant laborers in commercialized…

One of the major challenges that Canadian government officials felt they faced at the end of the nineteenth century was the development of the prairie West. By this time there were large urban centers in eastern Canada, but many Canadians worried that they had not truly ensured the future existence of their country. To do this the government…

From April 1990 through September 1991, the Rural Workplace Literacy Project (RWLP) provided migrant and seasonal farm workers from 15 agricultural worksites in California with literacy training. The training, designed to develop reading and job skills, involved 282 enrolled farm workers and 109 nonenrolled class attendants. Of the 13 classes…

Many farmworkers are faced with serious problems such as toxic drinking water, malnutrition, low levels of education and income, and poor health care. Based on statistical review, social surveys, and case studies, this document describes older farmworkers' living conditions, focusing on their housing problems. For many, housing is a luxury item…

Based on direct observation of farmworker housing, reviews of the literature on the subject, "openended" interviews with migrant workers or members of their families, and visits to some 75 camps in Texas, Florida, Delaware, Maryland, Michigan, and Colorado, this report examines the conditions of migrant housing. Part I provides a brief historical…

Examines how officials in Arvin, a small rural California community, developed a family housing project to reduce the housing shortage among agricultural workers. Suggested guidelines for similar programs include assessing area needs; matching housing types to needs; maintaining affordability; supervising construction; consulting with local…

Since the late 1970s, California's rural poor (frequently immigrants and refugees) have been engaged in grassroots efforts to change the cultural and political landscapes of their communities. Told in the words of rural people, this book presents six stories of struggle and empowerment. In Yuba City, Latino and East Indian farmworkers felt that…

The 1973 annual report describes services provided by the Rural Manpower Service (RMS) to 63 Michigan counties. Section I describes the organization of the RMS, and its 2 special projects -- Operation Hitchhike, and the National Migrant Worker Program (formerly the Mobility Facilitator Unit). Section II gives rural area demographic data and…

The Great Leap Forward disaster, characterized by a collapse in grain production and a widespread famine in China between 1959 and 1961, is found attributable to a systemic failure in central planning. Wishfully expecting a great leap in agricultural productivity from collectivization, the Chinese government accelerated its aggressive…

Many developing nations are engaged in efforts to transform the traditional agricultural sectors of their economies into modern forms that are more closely linked to the national economy and the export market. Almost universally, the traditional rights to land of the indigenous populations are ignored. The 12 essays in this book examine the…

During 1979, 27 Job Information Centers, manned in the local community on a volunteer basis, served as referral and information points for both applicants and employers and provided outreach services to rural areas. Of the 82,446 applicants seeking services, 54,153 were referred to jobs. Workers were placed in over 2,400 agricultural job openings.…

In rural Pakistan, agricultural land is owned by men and they use family labor, including women. Women usually transact no cash from cradle to grave. There is no social support for high achievement in their lives. The illiteracy rate among women is very high, especially in rural areas, where only 7.3 percent of women are literate. Poor…