There’s something beautiful happening in small-town America that nobody’s talking about, and I think it deserves recognition. While everyone focuses on stories about young people leaving rural communities for opportunities in cities, there’s another story that’s equally important but gets far less attention:
The story of the people who stay.
Not just the people who never leave—though they’re important too—but the people who make deliberate choices to remain in places that everyone else considers dead-end towns. The people who could leave but choose not to. The people who see potential where others see problems.
These are the people who keep small communities alive, and they’re not getting nearly enough credit for it.
I’ve been thinking about this because our little community has been facing the same challenges that plague rural areas everywhere: declining population, struggling local businesses, young people moving away for college and never coming back. The kind of slow-motion economic crisis that doesn’t make headlines but gradually hollows out entire regions.
But there are also people here who are bucking that trend.
These people are making sacrifices that most of our culture doesn’t value or understand.
And they’re doing essential work that keeps these places functioning.
Small towns only survive when people are willing to do the unglamorous work of community maintenance. Someone has to serve on the school board, volunteer for the fire department, organize community events, and run for city council. Someone has to coach youth sports, teach Sunday school, and coordinate disaster relief efforts.
In big cities, these roles get filled because there are so many people that volunteers are easy to find. In small towns, they get filled because the same committed people show up over and over again.
The stayers are the ones who show up. They’re the ones who take responsibility for the health and welfare of their communities because they understand that if they don’t do it, it won’t get done.
They’re the ones who believe that place matters, that community matters, that some things are worth preserving even when preservation is difficult.
I see this in Christian’s work with our charter school. Most of the people involved in getting it started and keeping it running are people who could have easier lives somewhere else but choose to stay here and work to make this place better.
They could move to bigger towns with more educational options, more job opportunities, more amenities. Instead, they’re staying and creating the educational options they want to see.
They’re investing their time, energy, and resources in a place because they believe it has value.
This kind of commitment runs counter to everything our mobile, opportunity-focused culture teaches us about success. We’re told that smart people follow opportunities wherever they lead, that staying in one place is limiting, that loyalty to location is old-fashioned and economically naive.
But I think there’s wisdom in staying that we’re in danger of losing.
When you stay in one place for a long time, you develop deep knowledge of that place.
The stayers are also the ones who maintain institutional memory.
Without stayers, communities lose their sense of identity and cohesion.
This doesn’t mean that leaving is always wrong or that staying is always right.
But I think we’ve over-corrected toward mobility and under-valued rootedness.
The stayers often don’t get recognition because their work isn’t flashy or newsworthy. They’re not disrupting industries or creating innovative solutions that scale globally. They’re doing the quiet, persistent work of maintaining and improving the places they call home.
But this work is essential, especially now.
As wealth and opportunity become increasingly concentrated in a few major metropolitan areas, rural communities need people who are committed to making them work. They need people who see potential instead of just problems, who are willing to invest time and energy in long-term solutions.
They need people who believe that every place deserves to thrive, not just the trendy ones.
So here’s to the stayers: the teachers and nurses and business owners who could make more money somewhere else but choose to serve their communities instead. The volunteers who show up for every school board meeting and community fundraiser. The parents who coach little league and organize youth programs.
Grateful for the stayers,
-Nichole
P.S. Your work matters, even when it doesn’t feel like it. Your commitment is creating something valuable that wouldn’t exist otherwise.
