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to provide them with modern child-growth and development practices (Tice, 1998).
The variety of settlement schools provided education access to Appalachian families
who had no other opportunities and provided a bridge between philanthropy and
local government to provide necessary services to families. Some settlement schools
helped Appalachian families to learn folk crafts they could sell to create a revenue
stream. These Appalachian folk crafts have played a role in culture and heritage
while also creating markets for the resulting handwork to tourists locally and
collectors outside of the region. The work may be sold as art, folk art, or folk craft
Dr. Denise Shockley, depending on the buyer. The crafter evolved into being a design specialist in folk
a member of Beta
Alpha Chapter in Ohio art who integrates artistic, technical, and vocational skills (Budkeey et al., 2016). As
State Organization, is the folk artists demonstrate traditional competencies, they also learn business and
Superintendent of Gallia- marketing practices to create professional quality artifacts that reflect their cultural
Vinton Educational Service practice. In addition to providing education and community support, the settlement
Center in Rio Grande, Ohio. schools thus fostered an industry and field of study.

dshockley@ The cultural inclusion and economic development espoused through settlement
galliavintonesc.org schools and the folk-craft movement can be harnessed to improve education. Based
on ideas from John Dewey’s laboratory school, a guest artist with specialized
knowledge assists in the integration of content. Young people learn folk craft as part
of their heritage or part of their formal education in school. Such training can bridge
the local and global, such as when students link knowledge and skills to learn science
and social studies by working with blacksmithing to connect school and community
(Morris, 2007). A knowledge of folklore and folk culture may infuse other subject
matter in school. Students can collect and analyze community folklore and folk craft
as classroom content (Laubach, 1979). Other subjects such as language arts, music,
or art may also intersect with folk crafts with a resulting increase in relevance and
engagement as students connect with their cultural heritage.
Ijaz and Ijaz (1981) explored how crafts, folk dance, music, and role play have
been used to explore cultural differences between groups of people. In their study,
student identification of an aesthetic problem led to a commitment or choice in their
interest-driven topic. The importance of the experience illustrated the commonalities
and differences between groups that live in proximity in the community.
These examples of folk crafts in the classroom align with what Lagender and
Stenøien (2011) identified as the three parts of student agency and experience:
skills are developed to accomplish a task as judged by the community, significant
experiences align with the student’s path in life, and students explore an interaction
between meaningfulness and craftsmanship. Furthermore, creating folk crafts that are
valued by community exists in contrast to a mass marketing society that encourages
lack of commitment and individualism. Students learn about and perpetuate their
culture as they do the folk craft while allowing for cultural change as they connect
with the art form. Appalachian students have moved beyond the settlement schools
to access folk crafts in their education.
While an artistic tradition does exist in the region, a void exists that parallels
those found in food and school deserts. Mulangu and Clark (2012) and Wight
and Kilham (2014) found in measuring food access in rural Ohio that a dearth of
competition among supermarkets, combined with a plethora of fast-food options,
limited accessibility to a good food supply, resulting in a food desert. Although not
all attempts at establishing remediation for food deserts are successful, food deserts
are a spatial representation of social injustice (Engler-Stringer et al., 2019). Schafft
et al. (2009) found rural school-age children living in a food desert had an increased

42 The Delta Kappa Gamma Bulletin: International Journal for Professional Educators