Rural school is a well-established topic in the field of educational research(Bard, Gardener & Wieland, 2006; Barley & Beesley, 2007), and it continues to attract sustained attention in an international framework particularly in terms of equity, quality and territorial cohesion (Ingersoll & Tran, 2023; Kjellsdotter & Erlandson, 2025; Welsh, 2025). Across Europe, reports and empirical studies have highlighted that delivering high-quality education in rural areas entails a distinctive set of challenges (constrained resources, the need to teach small yet highly heterogeneous groups, and the particular working conditions of teachers associated with rural teaching), factors that call for pedagogical, organisational and didactic approaches considering the rural contexts (Echazarra & Radinger, 2019; Fargas-Malet & Bagley, 2022; López-Gómez et al., 2020).

Spain is no exception and, in recent years, the discussion has intensified in connection with the debate of “España vaciada” (Empty Spain), which has underscored that rural schools fulfil functions that extend beyond strictly academic purposes (del Moral-Pérez et al., 2023). At the same time, research has documented tensions related to pedagogical coordination, teachers’ itinerancy, and the management of multi-grade classrooms (Raposo et al., 2024; Arroyo et al., 2025).

With this framework, the present contribution aims to conduct a situational diagnosis of the challenges faced by Early Childhood and Primary Education teachers in rural schools, with the objective of providing an empirical basis to inform context-sensitive professional development programmes and organisational decision-making in the context under study. The research focuses on the Ávila region, characterised by a high proportion of small municipalities and, consequently, a geographically dispersed student population. The relevance of this work is further reinforced by the lack of a recent and systematic assessment of the challenges perceived by Early Childhood and Primary teachers in Ávila’s rural schools.

This contribution is framed within the project “Rural school in the region of Ávila: challenges and teaching proposals. A study with Early Childhood and Primary teachers”, funded by the Council of Ávila under its 2025 call for proposals.

The study is currently being developed and consider a descriptive design based on an ad hoc questionnaire. This methodological choice makes it possible to combine, on the one hand, a broad overview through closed-ended items and, on the other, a more interpretive perspective on teachers' experiences and proposals through open-ended questions. The questionnaire includes classification variables related to schools (e.g., size, educational stage, resources) and teaching staff (e.g., experience and training), together with indicators addressing pedagogical, organizational, and resource/context-related challenges. It also incorporates open-ended questions focused on priority challenges, good practices, and improvement proposals. The population comprises Early Childhood and Primary Education teachers working in rural schools in Ávila region and the data collection, currently in progress, aims to obtain at least 100 valid questionnaires. Participation is voluntary and anonymous, and the survey is administered online via schools institutional emails. The analytical framework includes psychometric analyses to examine validity and reliability, descriptive statistics, and between-group comparisons. Open-ended responses will be analysed through thematic analysis and coding, and quantitative and qualitative evidence will be integrated through triangulation.

This study is expected to provide an up-to-date diagnosis of the main challenges perceived by Early Childhood and Primary Education teachers in rural schools in Ávila, together with their training needs and improvement proposals. As noted above, the research is ongoing and forms part of a broader funded project. From a quantitative perspective, the project will develop an Ávila Rural School Challenges Index (IRERA) to identify the areas where challenges are most strongly concentrated. As an initial working hypothesis, these may include multi-level planning, teacher itinerancy, staff cover and substitutions, and access to specialist support and technological resources. The study also analyses differences between variables such as school size, educational stage, professional experience, or degree of itinerancy, to capture the diversity of rural schooling realities within the region. Also, the qualitative analysis of open-ended responses will make it possible to examine how these challenges are experienced in everyday practice, the strategies teachers use to respond to them, and the practices they regard as particularly valuable in their contexts. The study also aims to gather concrete and feasible proposals to improve school organisation, strengthen relationships with the local community, and better align initial teacher education and continuing professional development with the conditions of rural schooling. The expected findings should support recommendations for schools, especially regarding the organisation and coordination of their educational projects, as well as for the education administration in areas such as training priorities and professional development programmes. In short, the study seeks to contribute to strengthening the quality and equity of rural schooling in the area under study, while offering insights that may also be transferable to other rural contexts in Spain, and beyond which is expected to be discussed in the session.

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