As Arizona rolls out a statewide plan to boost literacy and curb chronic absenteeism, some rural schools say they’ve already found what works: leaning on community partnerships and improvisation.
The Arizona Literacy Plan 2030 aims to send literacy coaches into rural districts and tackle attendance gaps that widened during the pandemic. But in places like Yavapai County, educators have spent years building their own solutions — from volunteer tutoring to after-school programs — to keep students engaged and reading at grade level despite limited funding and resources.
Even as the state steps in with new support, educators say real progress in rural schools may still depend on something harder to scale: local relationships, creativity and communities filling the gaps.
Steve King, the Yavapai County superintendent, said literacy rates and chronic absenteeism rates are linked. Chronic absenteeism is defined as kids missing 18 days of school or more per year, or about 10 days of the school year. He said many students are missing dozens of days per year, putting them further behind.
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At the start of the 2025-26 school year, King wrote to President Donald Trump asking him to release federal education funds that were being withheld at the time. The federal funds were to be used to fund 21st Century Community Learning Centers initiative, which in turn funds after-school programs.
Many students in rural schools like those in Yavapai County come from low-income backgrounds, and having programs like after-school activities helps motivate kids to show up to school, further improving literacy rates and chronic absenteeism.
In 2021, 67% of rural students in Arizona were from low-income families, according to Save Our Schools Arizona. Rural schools generally receive less per-pupil funding from the state than their urban counterparts. Greg Wyman, executive director of the Arizona Rural Schools Association, said that many rural districts have to stretch their dollars more than urban districts and sometimes are unable to pass bonds.
In Yavapai County, King said that only about half the districts would be considered rural based on the federal definition. But he said he'd consider most of the districts rural, save for a few districts including Chino Valley Unified School District and Prescott Unified School District. Both of those districts are members of the Arizona Rural Schools Association.
Districts tackle literacy, absenteeism with community partnerships
In Cornville, Laura Borden, a lead interventionist at Oak Creek School, said a lack of preschool access leaves many students behind before they even enter kindergarten.
If students are still learning kindergarten skills in first grade, that gap can quickly widen — and struggling students are more likely to disengage and miss school, she said.
Reading intervention is funded through Title I, which is federal funding provided to districts with children from low-income families. But Borgen said the reading intervention approaches vary by district. Borden said she is working with Yavapai County Superintendent King to help expand phonics-based instruction in rural schools, though many programs are costly.
To bridge the gap, Borden connects students with volunteer tutors from a nearby senior home. Third- or fourth-grade students meet twice a week after school.
“It has definitely improved the willingness of some of the kids to try, and it’s helping build that self-esteem,” Borgen said.
Funding often comes from patchwork solutions. Local nonprofit Low Income Student Aid helps cover costs ranging from classroom supplies to extracurricular fees and AP tests.
Founder Eric Wyles started the group after learning students were going without basic needs. The nonprofit now operates on a $251,000 annual budget and serves multiple districts across the Verde Valley.
“So many students miss out on these opportunities. We’re here to fill those gaps,” Wyles said.
After-school programs include archery, mountain biking
Teddy Armstrong, the 21st Century coordinator, said the district has had to improvise when it comes to sustaining the program, despite much of the 21st Century funding coming from the federal government.
Through community partnerships, the district has been able to have after-school activities like mountain biking, dance and archery. Wyles' organization helped pay for all of the equipment for the archery clubs, which are now at four of five of the district campuses.
Armstrong said the after-school programs help with chronic absenteeism because students are not allowed to attend the programs unless they show up to school that day. The leader of Wheel Fun, which is an organization that rents out mountain bikes, raised over $100,000 so the district could build a track for the students to practice mountain biking. The Boy Scouts then built gates in the bike parks to make them safer, Armstrong said.
There are now parks across multiple school sites, and they’re also open to the public on the weekends, Armstrong said.
When a district is in its fifth year of 21st Century grants, it no longer receives summer funding, Armstrong said. But the district was able to pull together enough funding to secure a summer program for all of the district’s elementary schools. That helps prevent the summer slide where students tend to fall behind during the summer months, Armstrong said.
The district was also able to secure funding to extend the program from four weeks to six weeks for the 2026 summer through grants.
Armstrong also emphasized the importance of making connections locally. Armstrong, for example, found someone to lead the harmonica club by having conversations. There are also volunteers that lead the other clubs like archery and mountain biking.
“There’s no way we could financially back any of that,” Armstrong said. “What schools actually get to work with is very, very little.”
