I grew up in southwestern Ohio, surrounded by woods, corn and soybean fields down the road from a small town. Although my childhood home fits what some might see as a stereotypical description of small town America, I never thought of it that way. Now, as a program officer at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) working to promote healthy, equitable communities, I’ve had the opportunity to travel to a number of rural places and small town across the United States and see the vast diversity of these places and the people who live in them.
Encompassing about three quarters of our nation’s land and home to about 15 percent of the population, rural and small town America is not just one kind of place. It includes the Midwest like the area where I grew up, and nearby Appalachia. It’s also places like the Mississippi Delta and the “Black Belt” of fertile land in the South, unincorporated colonias and many places along the U.S.-Mexico border, remote and geographically isolated “frontier” areas across the West, and Native lands across the country.
The rich diversity of history, culture, and racial and ethnic populations across rural America is an asset not only to those places, but also our nation. Rural economies are diverse, too, each with its own mix of industries—such as manufacturing, service industries, and goods production like farming, forestry, fishing, and mining.
Many rural communities share strengths such as a spirit of collaboration, resilience, interconnectedness, and interdependence. But many have also experienced common obstacles, including generations of isolation from opportunity, a lack of investment in infrastructure, and economic shifts that have led to high unemployment rates.
Each of these factors have a deep impact on the health and well-being of rural people and places, which is about much more than what happens in the doctor’s office. Last year, the annual County Health Rankings Key Findings Report, a project of RWJF and the University of Wisconsin Population Health Institute, illustrated that rural counties have had the highest rates of premature death for many years, lagging far behind urban and suburban counties. More people are uninsured, fewer people graduate college, and more children live in poverty.
This National Rural Health Day, people across the country are celebrating their commitment to work within their rural communities and regions to address and resolve their most challenging issues that impact health and well-being. These people know that just as there’s no “typical” rural place, there’s no one-size-fits-all solution that fits every local context. Strong state and national policies that enable local innovation by, for example, providing funding, technical assistance, and standards give a “boost” to the great things communities are already doing to respond to their local needs and priorities.
Here are a few examples of innovative local solutions in rural communities awarded the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Culture of Health Prize for their efforts to help people live the healthiest lives possible:
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