Our work in action

January 29, 2026

An Opportunity to Invest in Your Child: Understanding Trump Accounts

Building Long-Term Financial Security for Millions of Children: Tax-Advantaged Investment Accounts Coming in 2026 Beginning in 2026, a new and innovative program known as Trump Accounts will launch with the goal of building long-term financial security for millions of children across the United States. This initiative creates tax-advantaged investment accounts available to all U.S. citizens…

Why Be at School? Because the Future Is Built One Day at a Time

September 1, 2025

As National Attendance Awareness Month begins, I think back on 30 years in education—and it’s not the ceremonies or milestones I remember most, but the everyday moments that shape students’ lives. The morning a student shows up after missing a week. The teacher who pauses long enough to ask, “What’s going on?” in a calm…

Rural AmeriCorps: Building Communities from the Inside Out

August 14, 2025

— Dreama Gentry, President and CEO, Partners for Rural Impact AmeriCorps is often framed as an urban program, where young people travel to unfamiliar cities to serve and strengthen those urban places. As a result, the current conversation about defunding AmeriCorps centers on the devastating impact that cutting AmeriCorps programs would have in urban places.…

Turning the Page on Our Literacy Crisis Will Require All of Us

August 7, 2025

Editor’s Note: This blog post is co-authored by Dr. Felicia Cumings Smith, President & CEO of the National Center for Family Learning, and Dreama Gentry, Chief Executive Officer of Partners for Rural Impact. Both are native Kentuckians with decades of experience leading transformative education and literacy initiatives. In George Ella Lyon’s children’s book Come a…

Thompson Scholars: Achieving Excellence Through Equity for Appalachian Youth

November 3, 2023

Nestled in the hills of Manchester, Kentucky, sits an A-frame house with a gorgeous mountain view from the front window. But the most charming thing

Promise Neighborhood Alum Empowering the Next Generation

October 6, 2023

When Jackson County native McKenzie Peters was a student at Tyner Elementary School, she couldn’t have imagined someday being a Partners for Rural Impact legacy.

A Place-Based Approach to Flood Relief

August 4, 2023

A PLACE-BASED APPROACH TO FLOOD RELIEF In the early morning hours of July 28, 2022, our people awoke to water rising in their homes. Families

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