Putting rural communities at the center: A conversation with Sky Marietta

Sky Marietta is an assistant professor at the University of the Cumberlands, in Williamsburg, Kentucky, and director of the Learning Commons, a peer-based program to support the academic achievement of vulnerable college students. She also is the owner of Moonbow, a group of three small businesses that support Appalachian artists and suppliers in Corbin, Harlan, and Williamsburg.

Marietta grew up in Appalachian Kentucky, the fifth of her parents’ seven children. She went to college at Yale, became a teacher on the Navajo Nation, and then went on to receive her doctorate at the Harvard Graduate School of Education (HGSE) in child development, with a focus on language and literacy. Rural communities have been central to her work — her dissertation examined the differences between early literacy development in urban and rural poor communities, and she taught a class on rural education at HGSE as a postdoctoral fellow and lecturer. After finishing her doctorate, she launched an early childhood program in Harlan County, Kentucky, and worked as a specialist for Kentucky’s Cooperative Extension program. She has written three books, including Teaching Advanced Literacy Skills (co-authored with Emily Phillips Galloway and Nonie Lesaux), Making Assessment Matter (with Nonie Lesaux), and Rural Education in America: What Works for Our Students, Teachers, and Communities (with Geoff Marietta), which was published in 2020.

Marietta lives with her husband, Geoff, their sons Harlan and Perry, and two dogs. She blogs about their lives and businesses at www.kentuckymoonbow.com.