Project Aspire was created to identify poor rural students with academic potential and to provide them with academic and counseling support in advanced placement courses and prerequisites. This article describes Project Aspire and its foundations; the relevant lessons learned from the literature on poverty, small schools, rural schools, and gifted education; and the lessons learned from the counselors who work with students in these environments. These lessons are about what we know of the difficulties high-ability students of poverty face and how school personnel might assist these students more effectively. The 10 lessons learned, which the article examines in detail, are: (1) The rural population is difficult to define and is not homogeneous; (2) Much remains unknown about poverty in rural areas and the gifted children it affects; (3) Small schools, small towns, or rural areas have both advantages and disadvantages for students, including the gifted; (4) Identifying and serving gifted rural students from poverty requires consideration of their differing circumstances and values; (5) Rural high-ability students may lack foundation for success in advanced courses; (6) School climate and policies may inhibit academic advancement; (7) Students from poverty who have no family members experienced with higher education require exceptional levels of support in order to successfully graduate from college; (8) Rural high ability students from low-income families frequently require support to help overcome problems of inadequate self-efficacy, low self-esteem, and self-concept; (9) Students need to develop good study skills in order to be successful in rigorous courses; and (10) Developing a personal relationship with students of poverty is of key importance. These 10 lessons from Project Aspire offer a beginning point from which studies can be designed that identify the specific strategies most effective in finding and developing these gifted students' academic efforts.