Where's a Clue: The New Incarceration Deal and rural America

 

By: Jessica Stephens

   
    The world where five dollars, a phone book, and a smile were enough to begin building the blocks of success is gone. If living above the poverty line is a goal, digital access and digital literacy are vital. Rural America has always sat in the back; it has always been in the shadows, nor has it been brought up in debate or campaign unless someone exploited rural inhabitants for personal benefit. Incarcerated individuals are the most demonized and manipulated humans in the United States. When accessibility and the great digital divide are brought up in conversation, urban areas, and cities are used as examples, projects, and marks of success or failure. Prison and rural libraries are usually an afterthought if thought of at all.    

    According to the U.S. Census Bureau, being defined as rural is dictated by not being within the confines of an area with a population exceeding 50,000. For a free world library to be considered a rural library, it cannot serve a community of more than 25,000 (2). One-third of public libraries are rural and two-thirds of counties in the country are rural. The highest incarceration rates are in rural counties (4). Rural areas receive the least amount of funding and usually are located within the confines of governments practicing low tax law. Inhabitants are these territories have little access to the internet, education, and employment. Many of those living in rural areas are moving to more urban areas for work. Outsourcing and factory farming are forcing residents to seek financial gains elsewhere. This decline further hurts rural communities. The jobs available in rural areas typically don't require high degrees or any kind of digital mastery. For many the library is the only place that access to the internet is possible. However, libraries are not around the corner or down the street or even a twenty-minute drive away in these communities. 

    

    Libraries do not decorate a community or even a general area in some instances, nor is there enough funding to hire enough staff or give persons with high education financial incentive to apply. 33% of libraries that serve populations less than 2,500 only have, on average, 1.9 full time staff members (2). Only 25.5% of rural libraries offer internet hotspots while 51% of city libraries offer internet hotspots. 38% of rural libraries cannot afford to increase bandwidth and 18.7% don't know how to increase bandwidth, while only 6.5% of city libraries lack the knowledge to increase bandwidth (1). The lacking of digital equity also applies to library staff, not just the patrons. In-person or one-on-one training is necessary for staff and patrons alike to efficiently learn a new skill. Watching videos does not do as administration originally thought. Classes and programs are a vital organ of libraries in the free world and prisons, in rural areas and cities. However, when there is not enough funding or budget cuts, programming is one of the first things to suffer. For prisons, when the budget gets cut or the funding isn't luxurious (which it usually isn't anyway), the entire library system is stripped of basic needs. Formal programming, taught by teachers or experts in their field, is a low 15.3% for general computer skills, 15.4% for general software (like writing a document), 3.5% for web development, and 15.1% for coding. While IT support and staff training is a great factor in the current digital divide in the United States, it is the lowest for rural areas and almost non-existent in prison libraries. Less than a quarter in libraries across boundaries have IT support staff and rural libraries only have 15.6% of county IT support (1). In Los Angeles County Library, there is a program aimed at older participants learning STEAM (science, technology, engineering, arts, and math). However, rural libraries are less likely to pilot new programs in the same fashion as can a larger library in a more populated area. 

    As libraries everywhere face their own set of struggles, there is a part of the digital divide that goes unnoticed- families and individuals living in rural America and individuals surviving a system that sets one up to fail. Digital literacy has become a necessity for success. However, the great disparities among populations and communities currently cement the fate of those unseen and unheard. While technology skills are seen as irrelevant; while libraries go funded unfairly; while important decisions are not made by those with the highest knowledge of need and context, the digital divide will continue and the cycle of poverty, illiteracy, ignorance, and poor healthcare will continue.      

      

Works Cited

1. "2020 Public Library Technology Survey Summary Report". Public Library Association, 2020. American Library Association.
2. Grace, Madeleine. "A Country Divided: Exploring the Digital Divide in Rural vs. Urban America." 2020.
3. Hussain, Syed Tauseef. "Examining the status of prison libraries around the world: A literature review". IFLA Journal, 2023.
4. "Rural America Has Highest Jail Incarceration Rates in the U.S., Despite Low Crime Rates, New Report Reveals." Vera.