Tribes Excelling At Educating Their Young Native Americans Attending College In Record Numbers
As Peter Campbell sees it, the progress that college-educated American Indians are making for their tribes is the payoff for a long-overdue debt.
“This is what people died for,” says Campbell, counselor at Eastern Washington University’s Indian Education Center.
Tribal leaders often gave up land to the white government in return for the promise that their young people would be educated, Campbell says.
Among the promises frequently broken and fought over, it was restated in the Indian Self-Determination and Education Assistance Act of 1975.
That law acknowledged that the federal government had failed to prepare Indian children for meaningful leadership roles or give them the “personal satisfaction which education can and should provide.”
Congress was saying: “If you can do a better job, go for it.”
Many tribes accepted the challenge. They’ve taken control of reservation schools and spoken up about public schools. They’ve offered scholarships, held education powwows and fought teenage alcohol abuse.
The results are starting to show.
Between 1981 and 1993, there was a 44 percent increase in the number of male American Indians and Alaska Natives who received bachelor’s degrees (rising from 1,700 to 2,400). For females, the increase was 70 percent (from 1,900 to 3,200).
Tribal officials are keenly aware of who’s gotten what degree. On reservation after reservation in the Inland Northwest, they report record numbers attending college. The Kalispell Tribe, with only 247 enrolled members, had 12 students in college last year.
“One actually graduated with a degree in teaching,” says tribal manager David Bonga. “He’s teaching in Wellpinit now. We hope a position will open in Cusick and he’ll teach here.”
Darren Holmes, another Kalispell, is studying biology at Eastern Washington University. The tribe would like to see him back home, managing its natural resources department.
Charlene Abrahamson, a Spokane Indian, had considered working on the reservation. Instead, she’s putting her new EWU psychology degree to work for Washington Water Power, as its specialist in Indian relations.
“This way I feel like I’m contributing to a lot of tribes, not just one,” she says.
The numbers of Indian college graduates remains small. It’s hard to overcome cultural, financial and geographic barriers and get that sheepskin. The 1990 census showed that 9 percent of adult Native Americans had a four-year degree, compared to 20 percent of the total population.
Just getting a diploma can be a victory. When reservation officials brag about their graduates it’s often high school grads they have in mind.
“We had five graduate this year. Three of them are going to college,” says Velma Bahe, council chairman of the tiny Kootenai Tribe.
“Seven of our young ones are in college,” she adds. “One is getting a doctorate in psychology.”
Consuelo Cavalieri is that Ph.D.-in-the-making. She plans to be a professor, a career that can’t take her back home to Bonners Ferry, Idaho.
Like many if not most Indian college students, her goal is to get as close to home as possible. She wants to repay the tribe for paying years of tuition, perhaps by doing research aimed at helping therapists treat Native Americans.
She credits her family and in particular her grandmother, Amy Trice, for the lessons in perseverance that have helped her succeed even when “nobody in the class looks like me.”
, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Photo