Welcome to Coudersport, Pennsylvania:
In 2011 and 2012, I spent time in the town of Coudersport conducting fieldwork on mobility and opportunities of young people for a graduate research project. This consisted of spending time in the community and interviewing as many people as I could. I had an amazing time and the people were so wonderful—they gave me an outpouring of support for my project.
For my project, I looked at realistic opportunities (occupational, educational, etc.) for young people who are graduating (or who have graduated) from high school in the town. My original research intentions ballooned from looking at the current graduating class to then include the class of 1998 to then include as many people from as many classes over as many decades as I could get, which mainly ended up covering about three decades. My initial findings were that there are very few real and perceived opportunities for young people, and, perhaps more importantly, there is also a lack of emotional investment in the town on the part of young people, which makes it easy for them to leave and never return. The town is, in fact, losing its young people; its median age has increased and is significantly higher than the state/national average. Continued research in rural areas like Coudersport has been shedding light on these issues and has helped local leaders and parents think about ways to get their children involved in the local community, which will ultimately help to help sustain economic and community vitality in the future. (2012)
