The Native American Press (Bemidji, Minnesota), 1992-05-15

              A lost generation
The failure of public education for Indian children
By Bill Lawrence
In 1969, the United States Senate
Subcommittee on Indian Education
conducted an extensive study and
review of American Indian
education. The two and a half year
investigation concluded that the
education of the American Indian
was a national tragedy. The
Committee presented statistical data
documenting low achievement
among Indian students as evidence
of low self-esteem.
The report documented examples
ofthe negative achievement such as:
• Twenty one of twenty eight
Indian children in eighth grade
/in a Washington State school
were non-readers.
• One-third of 123 Indians in the
eighth grade were two to six
grades below grade-level. The
average grade for senior high
Indians was a "D" in the public
schools serving Yakima Indian
students.
• There was a regression in grade
point average in comparison with
non-Indians over a ten year period
in the Warm Springs School
system in Oregon.
• The drop-out rate exceeded 90
percent in some public school
districts, including the
Minneapolis Public School
system which had a 62 percent
drop-out rate.
The Senate report revealed that the
federal schools run by the Bureau of
Indian Affairs did not fare much
better - in some cases, the results
were worse.
The report documented low
academic performance of Indian
children in the BIA school systems.
• Students averaged two years
below national norms. Many
Indian students graduated with a
proficiency level at 9th grade or
below.
• In a class of 400 Indian students,
only 240 would graduate; of
these, 67 would enroll in college
with only 19 graduating. Only
one in 100 of the college
graduates would earn a master's
degree.
Ten years later in Minnesota, the
drop-out rate remained high for both
reservation and non-reservation
Indian students. While 94 percent of
all Minnesota's 16-17-year-olds
were enrolled in school, only 76
percent of Indians in this age group
were enrolled. As the age increased
to the 18-21-year-old group, the
disparity increased. The non-Indians
enrolled in this age group was 48
percent, while only 29 percent of
Indians were enrolled. Indians were
also less likely to pursue vocational
or college training after high school
than their non-Indian counterparts.
While slight increases were
attained during this decade by Indian
students, they still lagged far behind
their non-Indian counterparts.
Graduation rates increased from 25
percent to 54 percent and the median
age for Indians attending school
increased from 10.1 years to 12.1
years during this time frame. Indians
completing four years of college
increased from 2 percent to 6
percent. While progress has been
made, the disparity between Indians
and non-Indians is still significant.
Twenty years after the report,
during the decade of the 80's, the
picture of Indian education
continues to remain dismal. While
enrollment increased slightly - 1.34
percent from 1974 to 1984 - this
Indians blockade Arizona
casino during federal raid
Fort McDowell Indian
Reservation, Ariz. (AP) - Indians
in pickup trucks and earth movers
blockaded scores of federal agents
inside a casino for eight hours
Tuesday to protest new federal
regulations on reservation gambling
uperations.
The standoff at the Yavapai Indian
reservation ended when officials
agreed to temporarily leave the
seized machines locked in trailers in
the parking lot.
Statewide, agents seized about 750
video gambling machines at four
other reservation casinos without
opposition. Indian leaders said the
raids would deprive their tribes of
desperately needed jobs and millions
of dollars for social programs.
At Fort McDowell, outside
Scottsdale, Indians converged on the
casino as word of the dawn raid
spread. They blocked the only road
out with their own cars and pickup
trucks and the tribe's heavy
equipment
By noon, more than 100 Indians
ringed the parking lot of the casino,
advertised as "The Fort," watching a
few FBI agents mill around eight
moving vans loaded with more than
300 video machines. A single agent
stood on the roof of the one-story,
warehouse-like building, an M-16
rifle and binoculars in hand.
Twenty-five to 50 FBI agents and
U.S. marshals were inside, said Pam
Gullet, a spokeswoman for U.S.
Attorney Linda Akers in Phoenix.
She refused to comment on whether
criminal charges would be filed
against those who manned the
blockade.
Tribal Chairman Clinton Pattea
met at midday with Gov. Fife
Symington outside the reservation
and the leaders returned to tell those
on the blockade of the compromise.
Under its terms, the agents were
allowed to leave with the tractor
portions of the trucks, leaving the
trailers locked in the parking lot with
the video machines inside for a
10-day cooling-off period.
About 2 p.m., the protesters,
shouting and cheering, moved their
cars just far enough to let the truck
tractors and agents through.
Symington, who said Akers had
agreed to the compromise, promised
to work to speed state
unemployment payments to
hundreds of Indians put out of work
to speed state unemployment
payments to hundreds of Indians put
out of wouk by the raids. He also
promised to negotiate with the Fort
McDowell tribe about possible use
of the machines within the
framework of the federal rules.
The Indian Gaming Regulatory
Act of 1988 allows casino-style
gambling on reservations in states
where similar gambling is permitted
in some form off the reservation.
However, tribes and state officials
were supposed to negotiate
agreements on certain types of
gambling, including, as of this week,
video machines.
Arizona officials refused to
negotiate and urged the federal
government to crack down. Four
tribes filed a federal lawsuit mis year
in an effort to force negotiations.
Similar lawsuits have been filed in
other states, and tribes in five states
filed suit in federal court in
Washington, D.C, last week
challenging the rules themselves.
Tom Heffelfinger, U.S. attorney
for Minnesota, said all tribes in the
state have entered into compacts
with the state outlining what
gambling games are legal. "We have
no reason to raid anybody," he said.
"The scenario here is significantly
different than the scenario in
Arizona. Many ofthe tribes have not
entered into compacts in Arizona,
and their entire casinos were illegal.
All of our tribes have compacts."
There is one pending Minnesota
dispute. Heffelfinger said he asked
the Lower Sioux Reservation in
April to stop running a keno game at
Jackpot Junction in Morton. Keno is
not allowed under the reservation's
compact with the state. The tribe
says it has changed the game to meet
the compact's requirements, and
Heffelfinger's office is checking to
see if the tribe has complied.
The other Arizona raids were on
gambling operations run by the
Tohono O'odham Nation near
Tucson, the Pascua Yaqui tribe south
of Tucson, the Yavapai- Prescott tribe
in the northern Arizona town of
Prescott, and the Apache tribe in
Payson, also in northern Arizona.
increase was the lowest among
non-white ethnic groups. The
drop-out rate remained high and the
achievement levels were still
substantially lower than the
non-Indian students in the same
grade.
According to a study completed by
the Educational Management
Services (EMS), the actual Indian
student population decreased at the
senior high level, while non-Indian
population for the same grade level
increased. The largest proportion of
Indian students were attending
elementary school.
It is clear that public schools are
not places that Indian children want
to be. It also has become clear that
public schools tend to lose the
majority of Indian students over a
period of time.
In 1969, the public schools had a
drop-out rate of between 45-90
percent for Indian students and in
Minneapolis the drop-out rate was
62 percent. In the 1986-87 school
year, Minneapolis recorded a
drop-out rate of 10 percent - the
same as ten years earlier and the
drop-out rate for urban Indian
students was 19 to 20 percent. Both
rates are probably much higher,
since many public schools only
consider students enrolled in the
school who drop-out to be drop-outs;
if they drop-out during the summer
or if they move from the district and
never enroll in another school they
are not counted.
A more accurate picture of the
problem of drop-outs is reflected in
Failure/See page 3
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By and For the Native American Community
The
Native
American
Press
We support Equal Opportunity For All People
A Weekly Publication
founded in 1991
Volume 2 Issue 1
May15, 1992
Copyright, The Native American Press, 1992
Indian Magnet School tries to solve Minneapolis' high drop-out rate
m Wm
The upper left photo shows Rick Gresczyk's class of 6th graders: Emma Crowfeather, Deloris Gibbs and Melissa Wynde designing jingle
dresses. In the upper right Gresczyk's students are busily solving the Ojibwe Word Find as he looks over their answers, students include
Jason Richard, Matt Buffalohead, B.C. Lussier and Deloris Gibbs. The lower left photo finds the morning kindergarten students in Tracy
Ketterling's class solving jigsaw puzzles, students include Jessica St. Clair and Tyrone Isham. The lower right finds Julie Martin's kindergarten students hard at play, students in this picture include (from I to r) Chris Lemke, Earle Hanson and Jeremiah Bacon. Photos by Gary
Blair.
International gaming
conference in Bemidji
The First Nations Gaming
Conference will be held at the
Bemidji Holiday Inn May 15-18.
Two hundred representatives from
Indian tribes in Canada are expected
to attend. The conference,
organized by Carl Roberts of the
Roseau River Anishinabe First
Nation in Manitoba, will cover such
topics as financing and management
of gaming, legal issues, and a
presentation on sovereignty issues
by Roger Jourdain, former Red Lake
Tribal Chairman. Luncheon
speakers include state Sen. Skip
Finn, DFL-Cass Lake who will
speak on tribal/state relations and
Myron Ellis, chairman of the
Minnesota Indian Gaming
Association.
V
The Native American Press
uses recycled Newsprint
By Gary Blair
In 1987, to address the high
drop-out rate among American
Indian students in the Minneapolis
public school system and as the
result of the community's desire to
have a separate school for American
Indians because they felt Indian
students did not have the benefits of
culturally relevant programs and
often experienced discrimination in
the public school system, the idea of
an Indian Magnet School was bom.
As the first year of that school,
dubbed the Mt. Sini School, draws
to a close the principal. Donna Grant
reflects on the accomplishments
during the year.
Grant, a Chippewa from the Turtle
Mountain Indian Reservation in
North Dakota, and proud of her
culture, has seven years of
administrative educational
experience. She sets the tone for the
school. She hand-picked her staff,
she wanted to make sure this school
was given every chance to be
successful. She says, "I believe we
have a good start."
The school, located at 23rd Street
and Chicago Ave. South in the
heart of Minnesota's largest Indian
community - the Phillips
neighborhood - will soon be called
"The Four Winds School."
Some of the school's outside
structure still remains from the old
Mt. Sini Hospital, but inside it's
very much a modem school, with an
enrollment of 479 students, K-8.
With data clearly illustrating the
failure of public education for
American Indian students, came the
concept for an American Indian
program an a partial French
Immersion Program for the school.
This year's budget cuts were felt
throughout the Minneapolis school
district, and both programs are now
on hold, "hopefully only until next
year," Grant said. The only language
class currently being taught is
Ojibwe by elder Jesse Clark and his
program is funded from a different
source.
"Jesse Clark prayed for a school
like this for five years," said Grant.
The school has a teacher student
ratio of fourteen to one, with a few
classes at a twenty to one ratio.
There are 20 teachers who are
American Indian, 20 who are white,
and five who are Spanish, and one
African American. Eighty-five
percent of the students are American
Indian - 87 percent are of color -
and the remaining students are
white.
She has problems getting white
students to attend the school, maybe
because of the neighborhood, but
maybe it's because the school has no
track record yet.
"My first job here is safety," Grant
said. The Snider Liquor Store that's
located just one block from the
school has created real problems for
the students who have to use Peavey
Park for their outside activities. At
present it's not uncommon to see the
park police push the people that
drink in the park up against the
park's fence in order for the students
to play. The city promised they'd
have Sniders torn down before the
school opened last fall, and now
they are promising by June 30th.
"Next year Peavey Park will have all
new playground equipment, and will
be directly connected to the school,"
according to Grant.
The school has a security staff of
two full-time positions funded by a
program of the Minneapolis Indian
Health Board.
Students move about the school in
orderly groups, supervised by their
teachers. In the class rooms as well
as the school's office, teachers and
administrative staff interact with
students. The school has a full-time
social worker, and also an Indian
outreach worker who makes home
visits.
The school has several enrichment
programs such as the High-Five
Program where children can start
school at age five and the Latch-Key
Program, which is day-care with
before and after school hours.
Rick Gresczyk, a Chippewa from
the Mille Lacs Reservation, who
teaches sixth grade has found a new
tool to teach his students the Ojibwe
language, the Word Find Puzzles in
the Native American Press."
"The school is going to have
community education classes, as
well as adult basic education. We
want this school to serve the needs
of the community."
Grant, who will stand up for her
students, said, "We have a lot of
people coming here trying to study
us, I've had to set limits on that.
Making sure our students know they
come first is the most important goal
of the school." The school has the
same rules as the other schools in
the district. She doesn't know how
many of her staff live in the Indian
community, but said she knows
there are some that do. She's aware
of the on-going social problems in
the Indian community, and how they
affect her students. The school plans
to address these problems according
to Grant.
The school has older students from
the Center School Inc., who serve as
tutors and role models for the
younger students. The Center School
is an Indian alternative school also
located in the Phillips neighborhood.
In 1970, the number of American
Indian students in the Minneapolis
school district numbered 1,993.
Now, in 1990 we have 3,180
students.
Grant concluded, "It's been a
tough year. We have come a long
way, but we have more things we
want to do. What's most important
is the vision for the school and our
students."
Get out and Vote in your Tribal Elections! One of the strongest voices we have.
Red Lake elections May 20th. Minnesota Chippewa Tribal elections June 9, 1992.