“I just feel more at home among cornfields and gravel roads; it’s just where I’m from”: Rural college student identity & post-graduation plans

In an era of rural brain drain and youth outmigration from rural communities, it is unclear why some rural college students choose to return to rural communities after graduation (or some years later), while others do not. The purpose of this narrative inquiry was to explore rural college students’ sense of rural identity and how or if it relates to their post-graduation plans. Specifically, this study explored students’ post-graduation plans and how their identities and college experiences shaped or influenced those plans. Participants in this study included a purposefully selected sample of undergraduate students from rural communities attending the University of Iowa. The following research questions drove this study:

- In what ways do rural college students define their rural identity? How do rural college students make meaning of their rural identity relative to their other identities and their sense of purpose?

- How does a rural student’s sense of place and self influence their career and residential aspirations?

- How do students from rural backgrounds make the decision to return to their rural communities (or not) post-graduation? What college experiences or turning points shape that decision?

The research that is missing from the higher education literature is an understanding of how rural college students’ sense of rural identity relates to their post-graduation plans. Like their non-rural peers, college students from rural communities are also trying to figure out who they are (identity) and where they want to be (purpose) after graduation, but there is also the question of whether or not being “rural” is part of their identity. Some rural students come to college with already set career and residential aspirations, but many rural students change, develop, and grow during their time in college, which likely influences their post-graduation plans.

This exploratory, narrative inquiry investigated rural college students’ sense of identity and if it influenced their post-graduation plans. Data were collected through one-on-one interviews with participants. The knowledge generated from this study will provide valuable insights about rural college students that could be helpful to higher education professionals who work with rural college students and to high school educators in rural communities. Seeking a better understanding of rural college students is important because at the societal level, rural America needs college graduates to help sustain and grow rural communities. At the institutional level, higher education leaders would benefit from a deeper understanding of college students from rural communities because their unique identity and experience matters. And finally, at the individual level, this research is important for the rural college students who will benefit from faculty and staff being better prepared to recruit, retain, and support them to graduation.