Volume 35 1995 Contents
- Issue 1 October 1995
- EDITORIAL...ON BIA EDUCATION
John W. Tippeconnic III [pp. 1-5]
In this editorial, Dr. Tippeconnic illuminates the impact of current efforts to balance the federal budget on policies affecting the quality of education for American Indian/Alaska Native students. Evidence of the present trend toward tribally controlled schools and the shift of the BIA education budget to tribal control is reviewed. Reform efforts of the Bureau are recognized and examples of successful BIA funded and supported programs are cited. Dr. Tippeconnic points to the need for further research in Indian education and calls for individuals to become actively involved in insuring that progress toward continuing improvements in Indian education are a priority. - A DESCRIPTION OF FAMILY AND CHILD EDUCATION (FACE): A COMPREHENSIVE APPROACH TO FAMILY LITERACY
John W. Tippeconnic III [pp. 6-9]
This article describes the development of FACE, the Family and Child Education program, sponsored by the Office of Indian Education Programs, Bureau of Indian Affairs. Using the students' native language and culture to create stronger home-school relationships, the program attempts to break intergenerational cycles of illiteracy. - COMPARING BIA AND TRIBAL SCHOOLS WITH PUBLIC SCHOOLS: A LOOK AT THE YEAR 1990-91
D. Michael Pavel [pp. 10-15]
Drawing on data from the Schools & Staffing Survey sponsored by the National Center for Education Statistics, this paper discusses and compares features of Bureau of Indian Affairs and Tribal schools with public schools. - A RESEARCH STUDY TO DETERMINE PERCEPTIONS OF JOB-RELATED STRESS BY BUREAU OF INDIAN AFFAIRS EDUCATION EMPLOYEES
Linda Sue Warner; Jim Hastings [pp.16-29]
Utilizing questionnaires designed to elicit information about physical health, emotional/mental health, job performance, and attitude towards job, this study examined differences in perceptions of job stress by employees of BIA day schools and boarding schools. The research revealed a significant difference in the levels of perceived stress related to the type of position held at the school. - BIA SCHOOLS COMPLETE FIRST STEP OF REFORM EFFORT
Richard St. Germaine [pp. 30-38]
This article describes the Effective Schools correlates monitoring and evaluation initiative which was implemented by the Office of Indian Education Programs (OIEP) in the U.S. Department of Interior in the period 1989-94 in all BIA schools as a means for generating a process of comprehensive school improvement planning. This article discusses the findings from Phase One (the first five years) of the process with projections for the next step under the Goals 2000 school reform policy. - BUREAU SCHOOLS ADOPT GOALS 2000
Richard St. Germaine [pp. 39-43]
This article reviews the impact of federal education reform measures on Bureau of Indian Affairs schools. The Office of Indian Education Programs organized a school support team process to assist BIA-responsible schools with the development of consolidated school reform plans, curriculum content standards, opportunity to learn standards, and numerous restructuring initiatives. Despite serious Congressional cuts to Goals 2000 funding in 1995, the movement has begun and promises to transform BIA-responsible schools into highly effective centers of learning.
- EDITORIAL...ON BIA EDUCATION
- Issue 2 January 1996
- A COMPARISON OF INTEGRATED OUTDOOR EDUCATION ACTIVITIES AND TRADITIONAL SCIENCE LEARNING WITH AMERICAN INDIAN STUDENTS
Thomas T. Zwick; Kenneth W. Miller [pp. 1-9]
This study examines the validity of outdoor-based versus classroom-based science education experiences for American Indian students. The primary focus of the study analyzed a series of hands-on outdoor education activities and compared this experimental group with traditional textbook and classroom science education. Data collection utilized the California Achievement Test 85 (CAT) and compared the American Indian students and non-Indian students in both the experimental and control groups. Findings indicate the American Indian students provided with the outdoor-based science curriculum scored significantly higher than those presented with traditional classroom science methods. Also, there was no significant difference between the American Indian students and the non-Indian students in the experimental group. - NATIVE DROPOUTS AND NON-NATIVE DROPOUTS IN CANADA. TWO SOLITUDES OR A SOLITUDE SHARED?
Patrick Brady[pp. 10-20]
Dropout rates among Canadian Native students attending mainstream secondary schools, like those of their American counterparts, are significantly higher that those of their non-Native peers. Traditionally, this phenomenon has been explained in terms of the existence of a dissonance between the cultures of the students' home communities and those of the wider society as exemplified through such institutions as the public secondary school. This theory, while providing a plausible explanation, does not, however, fully explain why such large numbers of Canadian Native youth choose to exit the educational system prior to graduation. This article examines this issue and seeks to present an alternative to the conventional explanation of this phenomenon. - AMERICAN INDIAN CULTURES AND THE CLASSROOM
Linda Van Hamme [pp. 21-36]
Educators of American Indian children must assist in the maintenance of bonds to traditional and contemporary American Indian cultures while also providing preparation for successful participation in a culturally diverse, modern technological society. The issues that must be addressed by schools in order to meet these challenges include an understanding of the historical relationship between the various American Indian cultures and the American educational system; the issues, meanings, and perceptions revolving around the idea of multicultural education; the nature of culture itself as dynamic and continuously evolving; and, identification of the educational strategies that will be most effective in building on Indian children's cultural strengths.
- A COMPARISON OF INTEGRATED OUTDOOR EDUCATION ACTIVITIES AND TRADITIONAL SCIENCE LEARNING WITH AMERICAN INDIAN STUDENTS
- Issue 3 May 1996
- PREFACE
K. Tsianina Lomawaima[pp. 1-4]
In the preface to this special issue, Dr. Lomawaima, Guest Editor, presents a review of the current literature on the boarding school experience. - ESTELLE REEL, SUPERINTENDENT OF INDIAN SCHOOLS, 1898-1910 POLITICS, CURRICULUM, AND LAND
K. Tsianina Lomawaima[pp. 5-32]
To understand federal education for Indian people, we must examine the philosophies of federal educators as well as the experiences of Indians. This article focuses on Estelle Reel, Superintendent of Indian Schools from 1898 to 1910. Three aspects of Reel's career are noteworthy: (1) Politically astute, and a suffragist, she was an aggressive campaigner, the first woman nominated to a rank in the federal service requiring Senate ratification. (2) A product of the racist philosophies of her time, she believed Indians were a "lesser" race, but that non-threatening, culturally "innocuous" traits such as native crafts should be preserved. Specifically, crafts produced by women were an important economic resource for Indian families. The Uniform Course of Study she developed for the schools, especially the domestic curriculum, influenced generations of students. (3) Linked through family, friends, and profession to western cattle and land "barons," she facilitated transfer of Indian lands to non-Indians in her capacity as inspector of Indian schools (and by extension, observer of Indian agencies and lands). - "SHOW WHAT AN INDIAN CAN DO": SPORTS, MEMORY, AND ETHNIC IDENTITY AT FEDERAL INDIAN BOARDING SCHOOLS
John Bloom [pp. 33-48]
Over the past century, some of the greatest athletes in the United States have come from federally operated boarding schools for Native Americans. This article critically examines the diverse meanings of boarding school athletics for students, school administrators, and federal policy makers. The specific historical contexts of boarding school life shaped school sports. However, new theories about ethnic identity help to reveal how Native American students used sports as popular culture to reimagine and rearticulate their cultural memories, traditions, and identities. Drawing upon archival records and published sources from the Bureau of Indian Affairs, this paper explores the ideological contradictions that sports created for Anglo reformers and administrators, between those who understood athletics as symbolizing progress, and those who saw them as exploitative and unprogressive. From oral history accounts provided by former students, this article explores how sports provided a vehicle through which students expressed pride, or acted out mischief at school. Former students reveal how sports constituted a complex cultural practice where Native Americans could not only respond to an educational system that was often insensitive, but through which they could also experience pride, or pleasure, and create new ways of expressing their identities as Native Americans. - RUNAWAY BOYS, RESISTANT GIRLS: REBELLION AT FLANDREAU AND HASKELL, 1900-1940
Brenda Child [pp. 49-58]
Rebellion was a common feature of government boarding school life during the period from 1900 to 1940. Boarding schools imposed stringent regulations regarding home visits, and running away allowed students and families to circumvent the harsh system. Letters written by students and family members reveal factors that motivated students to run away, the different forms rebellion took, and the strong emotional history of the boarding school experience. Letters show that rebellion evoked anger and frustration in administrators, anguish and worry in parents, and demonstrate the considerable humor, resilience and resourcefulness of boarding school students. - "A NUCLEUS OF CIVILIZATION": AMERICAN INDIAN FAMILIES AT HAMPTON INSTITUTE IN THE LATE NINETEENTH CENTURY
W. Roger Buffalohead; Paulette Fairbanks Molin [pp. 59-94]
The training of young married couples was a component of the historic American Indian education program that existed at the Hampton Normal and Agricultural Institute in Hampton, Virginia in the late 19th century. Spearheaded by ethnographer Alice C. Fletcher with the recruitment of two Omaha couples in the fall of 1882, the program focused on the assimilation of a family unit. Twenty-three families, the majority Lakota from Dakota Territory, participated in the program from 1882 to 1891. During the period, there was little understanding of Indian families or the role of the family in tribal cultures. The program ended after less than a decade because of a combination of factors, including the expense of relocating entire families to Hampton, the "extra care" of couples and young children for school personnel, and the increase in the number of homes on the assimilationist model in reservation communities.
- PREFACE
* Page numbers refer to location in the original published version of the article.
