Editor-In-Chief's Foreword

On behalf of the Board of Directors and the staff at the Center for Rural Pennsylvania, I am excited to share the 2024 edition of Rural Policy: The Research Bulletin of the Center for Rural Pennsylvania. Since its founding in 1987, the Center has been dedicated to promoting policy research that supports rural communities across Pennsylvania. We successfully carry out this mission through both our own research and the grants we provide to faculty at our state universities. Rural Policy represents an important component of our ongoing efforts to make high-quality policy research accessible to the public, helping inform people about the critical issues facing rural Pennsylvania. We also appreciate our collaboration with Penn State Libraries, which enables us to make the Center’s research freely accessible to anyone with internet access.