Clarence Wesley

Chairman, San Carlos Apache Tribe

San Carlos, Arizona

All over the United States there is an uneasiness about the quality of education our American schools are providing for the youth of our nation. I see this uneasiness reflected in our national concern that Russia might be outstripping us in scientific leadership; in our concern over the growing problems of juvenile delinquency; and in the numerous articles questioning our school programs which are appearing so frequently, of late, in our national magazines and newspapers.

For some time I have felt the same kind of uneasiness and deep concern that all is not well with the educational job the schools on or adjacent to our reservations are doing for our Indian children. At San Carlos, for example, there are too many Apache youngsters dropping out of school before finishing their courses of study. Last year, I am told, 380 Apache children out of 1,100 dropped out of school for one reason or another before the end of the school term. Too few of our Apache children are finishing high school. Too few of those who do finish high school are going on to college or into some other professional training. When they do enter college, too many fail to make the grade there. I have been told that at the University of Arizona, in the very recent past, 25 out of 30 Indian students entering that University found themselves unable to compete with the non-Indian students there and had to drop out. I know that in recent years no Indian from the San Carlos Apache reservation has graduated from college, though several have started. There is too much juvenile delinquency on our reservation, and the problem is growing.

We ask ourselves why these things are so. I knew it is too glib to say that our students fail (a reason I have heard so often) because they are torn between two cultures. Everyone has to struggle with a changing culture--even all of you non-Indians, though your experience may not be as traumatic as for our Indian students. Everything else being equal, this struggle with a changing culture ought not to throw an Indian any more that it does anyone else.

I believe, too, that it is too glib to say that all these difficulties are due to the failure of the schools. There must be a complicity of reasons. But if it is the function of the schools to prepare Indians to become responsible participants in the American way of life, as I believe it is, then the schools must claim a share in the breakdown toward accomplishing this goal. It is time, in my opinion, to make a critical review of the effectiveness of our schools in aiding our Indian students to become adequately adjusted to his surroundings, either at his home base on the reservation, or in the outside world competing in the dominant culture. Particularly, I think, we need to look critically at the education program in those areas where, like at San Carlos, most of the children come from non-English speaking homes, and from homes where another culture is the ruling pattern.

I would like to get expert opinion on this, but I suspect our school are not beginning to tackle adequately the basic difficulties of language--the simple problem of communication—of understanding and being understood—which confronts, on all sides, the non-acculturated Indian child as he gets further along in school where both ideas and vocabulary become increasingly complex. I suspect that this failure to comprehend on the part of the Indian child accounts in large measure for the lessening interest and enthusiasm for school which I am told begins for Indian children along about the fifth grade.

Our San Carlos Apache children are served by five different types of schools. The majority above the fourth grade attend school in the neighboring towns of Globe and Fort Thomas, traveling to and from these schools by bus. There is a small public school going to the fourth grade on the reservation at the town of San Carlos which is attended by both white and Indian children. There are two mission schools on the reservation, and two government day schools, operated by the Bureau of Indian Affairs which also goes to the fourth grade. In addition to these varieties of schools there the non-reservation boarding schools available for those Apache children who need institutional care for one reason or another.

I think there is a place for all of these types of schools on our particular reservation. Those parents who want their children to have a church oriented education should have the right to send them to the mission schools. Where bus distances are too great for little children to go to the nearest public school, as in the case of San Carlos to Globe, there is still need for the government day school. At Bylas, where the Fort Thomas public school requires only a twelve-mile bus ride, movement is already under way to send all children, from beginners through high school, to the Fort Thomas off-reservation public school. The Apache parents seem to prefer this move, as more and more parents are already voluntarily sending their younger children to Fort Thomas along with their older brothers and sisters. As I see it, the big advantage of our Indian children attending the off-reservation public schools is the fact that here these youngsters are forced to use the English language on the playground because that is the only way they can make themselves understood by their non-Indian playmates. This way, in an ideal learning situation, they acquire greater facility with the English language and as a result, progress faster in school. Moreover, in their association with non-Indian children, both in the classroom and on the playground, they learn how to accommodate themselves to another culture and to learn how white children behave. This acquaintance with the behavorial patterns of another culture is, of course, a two-way process in that the non-Indian child also comes to understand Indian behavior in the same way. Thus both groups change and adjust one to the other; Indian and white come to know and appreciate each other, and so in school the way is paved toward a better working relationship for adulthood so that reservation lines no longer need to be the division point of separate, alien communities.

Unfortunately, the off-reservation public school has certain disadvantages for the Indian child, as well as advantages. These we should work to lessen or to eliminate. There is no close relationship between the Indian parent and the school beyond that of a passive relationship, such as attending school programs or school athletic games. There is little prospect here of a community centered school program where the Indian parents as well as the children are encouraged to participate in learning experiences that will improve the standards of home life and of the whole community. The handicap from which Indian children suffer most is that usually the off-reservation public school is too busy following the state adopted curriculum and meeting the needs of all the students to make the adaptations necessary to meet the needs of the non-English speaking Indian child who is already behind his group in knowledge of how to study and in comprehension. The school curriculum is geared to a whole set of concepts and literary background too often totally unfamiliar to an Indian child. Few teachers have the time--or know-how--to go back and supply that deficiency or to teach the reading skills necessary to catch up. So the Indian child becomes confused and lost, and sits unchallenged while the non-Indian part of the class moves eagerly ahead. Every such school having a sizeable Indian population should have a specialist in remedial reading, and/or, in teaching English as another language, available to help the Indian children catch up.

Another very real problem for the Indian child enrolled in the classroom of the public school is the fact that more often than not he comes from a home very much poorer than any of the non-Indian children in his class. His parents haven't the laundry facilities, sometimes not even the water or the room, to keep his clothing looking clean and fresh. They cannot buy him clothing equal to that of his classmates. Indian children are just like all children-they do not want to be different. They want to dress like and be like their peers. Many quit school because they cannot dress as well as their classmates.

The attitude of teachers toward him, as you know, has much to do with a child's interest in staying in school. Frequently teachers in public schools such as Globe or Fort Thomas know nothing about how the Indian children live, what their home problems are; what their values might be; what might motivate them to work harder in school; or what might be the final discouragement to drive them away from school. This kind of lack of knowledge would be easy to remedy with a little effort. I would like to see some program of orientation for all teachers of Indian children as they come newly to the job. For example, the teachers from Globe and Fort Thomas who will have Indian children in their classes might profitably spend several days on the San Carlos reservation in a well organized program which the tribal officers might work out, learning something about how the Apaches live, how the tribe does its business, how our people earn their living, what our reservation looks like, and something of our Apache history and traditions. I think this would help them understand the problems of their pupils better. There has been a great amount of anthropological study of Apache culture, and much of this has been written up in very reasonable form. This should be required reading for every teacher of Apache children, in every variety of schools, for I do not see how there can be truly effective teaching unless there is also sympathetic understanding and mutual respect. How can a child be motivated to learn, to do his best in any endeavor, if the wellsprings of his life and spirit are never touched?

At San Carlos there is still need for the government-day school operated by the Bureau of Indian Affairs. Since the Bureau is by its very nature an educational agency in the wide sense of the word, it is the agency, in my opinion, best equipped to handle the reservation school program.

If I had complete power to set up an ideal program I would insist that schools enroll Apache beginners at five years of age, instead of at six as now practiced. This would enable the children to begin learning English earlier, and give them a longer time for specialized instruction. For the beginners I would insist upon the employment of teachers especially trained in the skills of teaching English to non-English speaking youngsters. There are such specialists in language instruction and Apache children from non-English speaking homes need this kind of help. Above all, such teachers should be themselves competent to speak the English language clearly and without accent. For instance, in our schools now we have teachers instructing our beginners who have accents so thick it is difficult even for their colleagues to understand them. How confusing this must be to youngsters who already have difficulty learning to understand an alien tongue!

Another change I would make in our government day school is to make it more community centered. The parents of our children need education as much as do the youngsters, and a school program that includes them as well as the children where both children and adults engage in learning activities, could be a great impetus toward sound community development.

The non-reservation boarding schools meet a genuine and ever present need for our Apache group. It is to these schools that we send those boys and girls who have no homes of their own, or whose home environment is unstable. In addition to the boarding schools already in existence we find there is also a need for still another type of boarding school which will care for the youngster too much of a social problem to fit into the regular school, but who is not yet bad enough to be sent to reform school. There are many such boys and girls not only at San Carlos, but all over the Indian country; youngsters who are mixed up, defiant, and in need of specialized help. Now, there is no place for such a youngster. The regular boarding schools are not equipped to handle such cases, so usually they are sent home only to get deeper and deeper into trouble until they are lost. We should have special schools for this in-between youngster where he can receive expert psychiatric care, and guidance, to help him find his way out of his confusion and set him back on his way to becoming a useful, well adjusted citizen.

Indians all over the country are taking more and more steps toward the governing of their own affairs. At San Carlos we control our own law and order program, our cattle associations, our tribal government, and our tribal business enterprises. We are learning to govern ourselves by doing these things, and we are taking each learning experience step by step as any learner must do. We have not yet moved in the direction of governing our schools, but I have no doubt that too will come as more and more Apaches understand the importance of education to their children and the importance of having something to say about the kind of education their children receive. In the Bylas community and in the San Carlos community, Apaches could elect members of their own group to the school boards, but they do not yet feel enough at home with the problems of running their schools to seek this responsibility. They need to learn to take more responsibility for the operation and control of their communities and to serve their communities without pay as is done in our other American communities. The San Carlos Apaches have an educational committee appointed by the Tribal Council which acts in an advisory capacity to both the government and the public schools. This committee wields genuine influence. It is, I think, a preliminary step toward arousing interest in the more active control of the schools through school board membership.

I have been asked whether our educated youth should be encouraged to return to work on the reservation after they have completed their training. While every individual should have the right to choose where he will live and work, it is our hope that a good number of our educated young Apaches will return to their home communities to make their careers there. Those who have vision and ambition and the energetic drive to forge ahead are exactly the kind of leadership we need desperately on the reservation. They are the kind most likely to have the imagination and the spirit to create opportunity for themselves and others on the reservation through economic development of our resources. We need this kind of skill and leadership. If none of the brightest and best should return; if all of the best leadership should continually be drained away from our homeland, we could have only stagnation and hopelessness on the reservation. There would be left only those who fight progress and change, or who have no training or experience to do the things that must be done if we are to improve our standard of living and take our place in the nation as responsible citizens. We need the young, ambitious, trained leaders. Those who are interested in returning here to work should be helped in every way to find the kind of job opportunities that will give their abilities the widest scope.

I have only one further point I wish to make. I realize the fact that there are people who talk about integration, assimilation, acculturation, first class citizenship, etc. But you know the American Indians have something different that was bestowed upon them by the grace of God, such as our songs, tribal dances, arts and crafts, our religion, games and stories. Some of these are fast disappearing and my question is: are we going to continue to lose these precious gifts through this process of education or becoming white men? Or should we continue to identify ourselves as Indians, which to me is no disgrace.