Volume 33 Number 3
May 1994

Nancy H. Hornberger

The case studies in this volume speak clearly and cogently of efforts to bring about change in indigenous schooling in directions that the local, native community wants. Each case treats a different community and a different curricular emphasis–the Ciulistet and the teaching of mathematics in Yup'ik communities of Alaska, curricular reform in bilingual education in a Navajo community of Arizona, and the development of instructional practices and curriculum structures that foster critical literacy in other Navajo communities of Arizona. Yet the cases also bring out common themes: the importance of a collaborative process between local and outside educators; the changed organization of language, literacy, and math instruction as local knowledge becomes the basis for curriculum; and the enabling and disabling conditions for such change to occur.

Jerry Lipka and Esther Ilutsik talk about increased local autonomy; Galena Dick, Dan Estell, and Teresa McCarty mention the growing sense of indigenous teacher ownership of the curriculum; and Daniel McLaughlin looks toward student and community empowerment in making school curricular and administrative decisions. In each case, the process described is one in which outside researcher and local community member are joined in an effort to, in Lipka's phrase, negotiate the culture of schooling. In the process of negotiating the culture of schooling, the participants inevitably reach a third cultural reality (Malinowski, 1961 [1945]; Stairs, 1994), which is neither the local culture nor the school culture. Lipka argues that the process of negotiating the culture of schooling goes beyond both the "overly deterministic structuralism" of society and schooling under which there is no scope for school change other than everything becoming more equitable, and the "overly simplistic view of cultural compatibility and incompatibility," which underestimates the variability and choices available to indigenous individuals and groups.

An important vehicle for this collaborative process, one which again runs through all the cases, is a form of teacher-researcher study group. Comprised of local and outside educators–usually the teachers of the school, university-based consultants or researchers, and sometimes local elders as well–these study groups pursue an inquiry process that, to one degree or another, includes book study, the generation and analysis of data on local knowledge, and the translation of either or both to the curriculum. Lipka describes the 12-year evolution and present initiatives of such a study group, the Ciulistet, made up of teachers, aides, university faculty, and elders from six villages. Ilutsik testifies to the impact participation in the group has had on her life. Lipka notes that though the Ciulistet is collecting and analyzing significant pieces of local knowledge, a commitment from the community and the school to implement Ciulistet findings varies according to local political conditions. In comparison, the curricular innovations arising from the study group on alternative assessment described by Dick, Estell, and McCarty and from McLaughlin's work on curriculum development and critical theory for teachers of Navajo children, both find immediate implementation in their respective schools.

In all three cases, the curricular innovation sought is, specifically, the active valuing of local knowledge that leads to change in the organization of language, literacy, and math instruction. Thus, for Ilutsik and Lipka, a Yup'ik math curriculum might include Yup'ik notions of cardinal numbers, pattern identification such as that practiced in parka decoration, visualization such as that used by elders in navigation, and direct empirical observation such as that used by elders in teaching the Ciulistet members. At Rough Rock School, Dick, Estell, and McCarty describe the implementation of a language arts curriculum that incorporates Navajo knowledge and includes the use of specific language and literacy development strategies for both English and Navajo, cooperative classroom structures organized around learning centers, and a teacher-generated criterion-referenced assessment system. Similarly, McLaughlin, following Cummins (1986), argues that a critical curriculum that leads to indigenous student empowerment is one characterized by incorporation of the students' language in the process and content of schooling, pedagogical practices that encourage interaction and collaboration, and assessment which advocates for the student rather than legitimizing transmission models of instruction.

Despite the strides made in each case, none of the cases is free of conditions that work against the kind of change envisioned. Dick, Estell, and McCarty highlight the scarcity of quality materials in Navajo and of bilingual Navajo- and English-speaking teachers, the skills-based approach which runs directly counter to the criterion-referenced assessment used in the program, and the uncertain and federally-funded nature of the funding. Lipka discusses the difficulty of negotiating schooling implementing the Ciulistet findings. McLaughlin cautions that the problems inherent in deficit-driven approaches are only symptomatic of a much larger, structural issue which amounts to a wall of resistance encoutered by any true societal innovation.

At the same time, there are characteristics common to all three cases which suggest themselves as enabling conditions for such a program of change: language vitality, versatile bilingual/bicultural personnel, and stability of site. Though not entirely unthreatened, both Navajo and Yup'ik are major indigenous languages. Dick, Estell, and McCarty note that Navajo is the majority language of the Rough Rock area, and Lipka tells us that Yup'ik is one of the few Native Alaska languages expected to survive into the next century. Children in Navajo and Yup'ik communities still grow up and arrive at school speaking the community language. There is a reservoir of active knowledge of the local language and culture upon which to draw.

However, such knowledge would remain unavailable to the school were it not for the bilingual/bicultural personnel who can communicate in both contexts. Ilutsik's testimony eloquently captures the bilingual/bicultural person's experience as she moves from first to second language/culture and back again; she and Dick represent the versatility of bilingual/bicultural personnel who are the indispensable change agents in such efforts.

Finally, most of the cases depict long-term stability of the change site: stability of site personnel, governance, and, to a certain degree, funding. The Ciulistet group, though its members are separated by great distances, has been collaborating for 12 years; this group, however, lacks the advantages of access to school governance and stable funding. The Navajo bilingual programs and the more recent process of curricular reform there represent long-term collaborative efforts going back to the 1960s and the early 1980s, respectively, during which governance of the schools has remained in the hands of the local Indian community, and federal funding has remained, at least recently, relatively steady.

It is striking that in my own research on bilingual education and language maintenance in another indigenous American community, the Quechua speakers of southern highland Peru, the same conclusions could be drawn. There too, the relative vitality of the language, Quechua, the largest indigenous language, with 10-15 million speakers; the crucial participation of local and versatile bilingual/bicultural personnel in a collaborative process of curricular and instructional reform; and the long-term commitment of outside consultants (in this case, the German Technical Aid Society over a span of two decades), can be counted as key factors in producing what has been the most successful bilingual education endeavor in Peru to date (Hornberger, 1988). Though itself weakened more recently by Peru's severe economic and political troubles of the last decade, that bilingual education program has seen its principles adopted in newer programs in neighboring Ecuador and Bolivia. It is hoped that more such collaborative endeavors will be undertaken in indigenous communities throughout the Americas, so that the indigenous vitality, versatility, and stability they depend on and engender can be extended.