CIVIC LIFE

‘Change is in the Air – in Redlands!’

A panel of residents, business owners, and community stakeholders discuss the southern California city then, and now.

LOCAL INSTITUTIONS

How a Community Center Helps a Town Rise Again

Residents of Fort Lawn, South Carolina used a community development model to identify 51 actionable goals to improve their town. Today, they’re checking off the list, one by one.

APPLY LESSONS FROM AROUND THE WORLD

Discovering ‘Cultural Debris’: Making a Big World Small By Paying Attention to Permanent Things

Sharing what we experience when we travel can open communities to themselves and others.

PODCAST

Inside Our Towns: John Kropf

John Kropf discusses his latest book, 'Color Capital of the World: Growing Up with the Legacy of a Crayon Company', which explores Sandusky, Ohio's innovative industrial heritage and his family's role in it.

EDUCATION

Reviving America, One College Town at a Time

How symbiotic relationships between colleges and their communities have reaped rewards in Erie, Pennsylvania, and Waterville, Maine.

COMMUNITIES THAT WORK

‘How America’s Towns are Writing the Future of the Country’

Residents, coaches, reporters discuss local-level community revitalization initiative at Jefferson Educational Society Global Summit event.

Big Little Ideas

How Local Governments Can Engage Residents of All Ages

When community members can't, or don't, or won't, go to town halls to attend local government meetings, some local elected officials have found a way to go to their constituents.

COMMUNITIES THAT WORK

Kershaw invests in community with new ideas in old spaces

A train depot that’s a museum. A bank branch building that’s become a library. Another former bank that is serving as an early education center. Here is how this South Carolina town is repurposing buildings of the past to build up its future.

PODCAST

Inside Our Towns: Tighe Bullock

Evan Sanford catches up with Tighe Bullock, the accountant, lawyer, downtown developer, and construction contractor, on his latest work in Charleston, West Virginia.

CIVIC LIFE

To Both See and Tell the Country: From the Road through North Carolina to South Carolina

Why seeing more of America matters.

EDUCATION

'We Fly,' in Indiana

It's time to judge colleges by their contributions to the economic and civic life of their communities. Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana, passes the test brilliantly.

CIVIC LIFE

'To Arrive Where We Started and Know the Place for the First Time'

The America that Americans Don't Know About, and Why That Matters

EDUCATION

‘When Gown Embraces Town’: Two Stories from Indiana

What is happening in the 'Middletown' of Muncie, and why it matters.

ARTS

An Outsider Works with Insiders: Examples from Akron and Cleveland

Mac Love, who has spent much of his life outside Ohio, uses new technologies to bring community residents and college students together. That collaborative approach is now helping citizens’ voices be heard and is driving meaningful change in their neighborhoods.   

RURAL & REGIONAL

A Dining-room Meeting Begins a New Chapter in One Town’s Story

As Isaac and Heidi Tucker saw it, there was no use in waiting for their town to improve itself. Instead, they took action, and are rallying renewal efforts in Dillsburg, Pennsylvania today.

WATER

Past, Present, and Future on the Water: Using StoryMaps to Explore Bucksport, Maine

What does a mile-long stretch along the Penobscot River tell the walker about Bucksport, Maine? As it turns out, a lot.