MISSOULA (LEE) - Education advocates will
present their views on what needs to happen to fulfill Montana's
constitutional mandate to teach others about Native peoples during a
daylong seminar Friday.
The mandate has been enforced recently by a spate
of legal rulings from state courts calling on educators to embrace
the constitution and the Legislature's Indian Education for All
Act.
"One of the challenges in implementing Indian Education
for All is in training new teachers and in the professional
development of the 10,000 teachers in the field," said Paul Rowland,
dean of the University of Montana's School of Education. "What is it
going to take to make sure we're preparing teachers who can
adequately implement the act?"
Rowland is among a dozen
speakers who will attend the Tribal Leaders Institute and the
O'Connor Center for the Rocky Mountain West seminar this week in the
House Chambers at the state Capitol. Participants will discuss how
to bring Indian education into Montana classrooms, including the
need to close the achievement gap between Native and non-Native
students.
"There seems to be a renewed interest in our
Legislature and the general public in fulfilling the mandate," said
Bob Brown, a senior fellow at UM's Center for the Rocky Mountain
West.
Even though Montanans voted for a constitutional
mandate on Indian education more than three decades ago, lawmakers
and educators continue to flounder on how to carry out that mandate.
The Tribal Leaders Institute seminar will create a forum for voices
in the trenches.
"This institute provides Montana's Native
population one of its few opportunities to directly influence the
interim legislative committee, both in Indian Education for All and
to eliminate the achievement gap between Indian students and
others," said Pat Williams, also a senior fellow at the Center for
the Rocky Mountain West. "It is Indian voices we need to listen
to."
Earl Barlow, a scheduled seminar speaker, was the Indian
education supervisor in the state's Office of Public Instruction in
1970 when constitutional delegates were chosen to set the course for
the new Montana Constitution.
Barlow, a Blackfeet citizen who
lives in Spokane, Wash., helped provide a Native perspective leading
lawmakers to embrace changes that would improve the quality of
education for Native students and those trying to learn more about
Native history.
"This article in the constitution is your
grand plan, it's your blueprint for government ... the constitution
tells you what your vision is. Now you have to implement that,"
Barlow told lawmakers when he later lobbied them to pass the state's
Indian Studies Law for teachers in 1973.
The Legislature
passed the law, but then dramatically altered it three years later.
"The Legislature took the teeth right out of it," he
said.
But it's the kind of legislation that's needed today,
Barlow said. "But we have to do a better job of informing teachers.
There needs to be a broader-based approach to sensitizing teachers
to the unique needs of Indian students because teachers are the
solution. They are not the problem."
Seminar presenter
Maylinn Smith, director of the Indian Law Clinic at the University
of Montana, will provide an overview of the federal trust
responsibility in providing an education to Native
children.
Educators need to have appropriate, accessible
information, she said. Ultimately, accurate education will do much
to strengthen tribal economies and will help eliminate racial
tensions, Smith said. "By educating people, you'll find people more
inclined to work in Indian country."
Reporter Jodi Rave can
be reached at 1-800-366-7186, Ext. 299, or at jodi.rave@missoulian.com.
