Corey Still (Cherokee/United Keetoowah Band of Cherokee Indians) is a student board member of the National Indian Education Association. He is a graduate student in higher education leadership at Northeastern State University in Tahlequah, Okla.
The late American Indian philosopher Vine Deloria Jr. once wrote, “Every society needs educated people, but the primary responsibility of educated people is to bring wisdom back into the community and make it available to others so that the lives they are leading make sense.” In many ways, the essence of education is to share knowledge and wisdom to improve the lives of other people. However, if we analyze history, Native people are reminded that education has too often been underfunded or masked as a tool for the federal government’s assimilation and termination policies.
As Native people, we are the only demographic in the United States that the federal government has a moral obligation to educate—a trust responsibility to provide adequate resources for Native-serving programs, which include education, in exchange for the land and resources tribes ceded years ago. And yet, the result of this trust responsibility to our students has been laden with decades of destructive federal policy.
The assimilation era—a period that began after the Civil War and lasted through the early 20th century—stifled Native education as boarding schools sought to end the cultural and linguistic traditions of Native communities. Fortunately, as tribes regained their self-determination with the resurgence of tribal sovereignty, they secured the ability to administer and direct their tribal education programs. As improvements are made, we, as Native peoples, must look back and recognize the policies that reformed Native education, laying the groundwork for future policies to be enacted.
The Indian Education Act of 1972 should be recognized as a turning point for Native education. It was critical for improving the quality of education for American Indians and Alaska Natives after a period when cultural decline was commonplace within tribal communities.
Native advocates worked with Congress on the law to meet the unique needs of American Indian and Alaska Native students and to close the educational gap that had formed between Natives and their non-Native peers. The law authorized federal education assistance at higher monetary levels than what had been allocated through the federal Office of Education, the precursor to the U.S. Department of Education under the old Department of Health, Education, and Welfare; and the Bureau of Indian Affairs, under the U.S. Department of the Interior.
The law also formed a specific Office of Indian Education within the Office of Education, creating the National Advisory Council for Indian Education—a forum for providing input to Congress and the administration on Native education priorities. Tribes and Native communities considered the creation of these formal bodies a much-needed step forward as Native education advocates sought to be heard at higher levels within the federal government.
As a proud tribal citizen, I can stand and say that I am a product of the Indian Education Act and Title VII programming.”
While the increased administrative attention was important to providing a voice for Native education, the Indian Education Act more importantly laid a foundation for future legislation, such as Title VII , which would preserve and promote the protection, use, and teaching of cultural and linguistic education in public schools.
Title VII, the stand-alone Native education program under the No Child Left Behind Act, has been one of the most important pieces of legislation for reforming Native education. It must be protected as future versions of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act are developed by Congress. Under Title VII, Native education stakeholders work with schools and higher education institutions to ensure that culture-based education is included in school curricula and that it meets the educational needs of American Indian, Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian students.
The supplemental education programs and funding under Title VII have contributed greatly to the education of our Native students by bringing their local culture into the public schools they attend. And yet, while there have been successes, we still continue to fight outside pressure for the right to an equal education that includes our Native cultural values and traditions.
