University of Wisconsin Oshkosh

Intertribal Pre-College Program

No Child (even Native Americans) Left Behind
By Richard B. Williams

Friday, January 31, 2003 - In April 2001, No Child Left Behind was launched as the Bush administration's sweeping new educational initiative that was hailed as "revolutionary" in bringing our nation's public school systems into the 21st century. It was promoted as "the great equalizer" in transforming underperforming schools into models of educational efficiency and academic excellence. "Accountability" was the clarion call across the country in raising test scores in math and reading.

For Indian children and their parents on reservations across the country, however, this unfunded federal mandate has the potential for disaster. In a population that already has a 56 percent out rate and more than a century of educational failure, the "corrective actions" imposed by NCLB are unrealistic and prohibitive in helping reservation schools achieve educational parity with their non-Native peers.

Indian children are not only being left further behind than before, but legislation without Indian consultation further illustrates the system responsibility to provide education to Indian tribes.

Consider the sanctions. Under NCLB, parents now have the right to transfer their children to a "successful" school within the same district. But the reality for Indian parents in remote areas like PineRidge, S.D., and Rock Point, Ariz., where there is likely only ones school, busing and transfers are simply not viable alternatives. Removing underperforming teachers also presents a problem. On the reservations, the annual turnover rate is as high as 70 percent. How will these school districts replace underperforming teachers when turnover is already a chronic issue?

Additionally, changing administrations or shutting down the schools in communities with very limited resources and trained personnel is simply not an option for a population with the least access to education of any racial or socio-economic group in the country.

"If you're a parent with a child in an underperforming school on a reservation, where are you going to go?" said John Cheek, executive director of the National Indian Education Association. "This act doesn't address the government's treaty obligations to the tribes at all."

Another mandate by NCLB is the training and educational requirements of teachers' aides, now known as "paraprofessionals." Under current law, paraprofessionals have until the 2005-06 school year to obtain at least an associate's degree. But many aides working for just above minimum wage on the reservation do not have the resources, the access to a local college or even the technology for long-distance learning to obtain their certificates.

Funding for tuition and training went out to states as block grants, but tribal schools are not eligible for these grants. Consequently, many Indian paraprofessionals in the ineligible schools may lose their jobs, although entities such as Lumina Foundation for Education are stepping forward to help them meet the higher education requirements.

"The law doesn't take into account the practical application of these requirements," said Verne Duus, legislative consultant for NIEA. "But the biggest problem is that the government has not even made a pretense of fully funding this initiative, and we simply cannot achieve these results without resources. This is going to be devastating for the schools, especially those on reservations."

But the main concern of those in Indian education is the long term impact of inadequate education on Native communities. According to the 2000 Census, American Indians are the fastest-growing racial group in the country. As the population continues to grow, producing a skilled local workforce will become nearly impossible. Jobs will become even more critical in the areas of tribal law, accounting, medicine, education, technology and business in the decades to come.

NCLB has the promise of hope and recognizes the need for reform. The missing piece, however, is real change. The building blocks of success for Indian students include replacing competitive classrooms with cooperative ones; teaching to students' learning styles; modifying curricula so that children see themselves in stories and in the math assignments; and connecting culture and language as core components of the student's experience.

Most importantly, reform means caring about the children in the classroom. Let's stop the systemic failure and meet the needs of the students in a positive learning environment. Let's make changes that will reform our schools so that we can be proud of the good that is happening. We know what is possible based on the success of the tribal college movement. Let's make No Child Left Behind a reality for all of America's children.

Richard B. Williams is executive director of the American Indian College Fund, a historian, educator and the founder of the Upward Bound Program at the University of Colorado at Boulder. He is also a former member of The Post's Compass panel.

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