Request

[Haley De Korne]

Hi Bernadette,
I'm attaching a few articles that describe the importance & benefits of Native language education.

Also, I don't know if it will be useful, but there are several states that have laws that argue that teaching native languages is crucial.  The strongest one is probably Washington.  

Here's a link to their policy statement:
http://apps.leg.wa.gov/RCW/default.aspx?cite=28A.410.045

Here's the part of the text that I'm thinking about.  They cite their own reasons, and the national law promoting Native language education (Native American Languages Act):

Findings -- 2007 c 319:  "The legislature finds that:

    
 (1) Teaching first peoples' languages, cultures, and oral tribal 
traditions is a critical factor in fostering successful educational 
experiences and promoting cultural sensitivity for all students.  
Experience shows that such teaching dramatically raises student 
achievement and that the effect is particularly strong for Native 
American students;

     (2) Native American students have the 
highest high school dropout rate among all groups of students.  Less 
than one-fourth of Native American students in the class of 2008 are on 
track to graduate based on the results of the Washington assessment of 
student learning.  Positive and supportive educational experiences are 
critical for the success of Native American students;

     (3) 
The sole expertise of sovereign tribal governments whose traditional 
lands and territories lie within the borders of the state of Washington 
in the transmission of their indigenous languages, heritage, cultural 
knowledge, histories, customs, and traditions should be honored;

    
 (4) Government-to-government collaboration between the state and the 
sovereign tribal governments whose traditional lands and territories lie
 within the borders of the state of Washington serves to implement the 
spirit of the 1989 centennial accord and other similar 
government-to-government agreements, including the 2004 accord between 
the federally recognized Indian tribes with treaty reserved rights in 
the state of Washington;

     (5) Establishing a first peoples' 
language, culture, and oral tribal traditions teacher certification 
program both achieves educational objectives and models effective 
government-to-government relationships;

     (6) Establishing a 
first peoples' language, culture, and oral tribal traditions 
certification program implements the following policy objectives of the 
federal Native American languages act of 1990 (P.L. 101-477) in a 
tangible way:

     (a) To preserve, protect, and promote the 
rights and freedom of Native Americans to use, practice, and develop 
Native American languages;

     (b) To allow exceptions to 
teacher certification requirements for federal programs and programs 
funded in whole or in part by the federal government, for instruction in
 Native American languages when such teacher certification requirements 
hinder the employment of qualified teachers who teach in Native American
 languages, and to encourage state and territorial governments to make 
similar exceptions;

     (c) To encourage and support the use of 
Native American languages as a medium of instruction in order to 
encourage and support Native American language survival, educational 
opportunity, increased student success and performance, increased 
student awareness and knowledge of their culture and history, and 
increased student and community pride;

     (d) To encourage 
state and local education programs to work with Native American parents,
 educators, Indian tribes, and other Native American governing bodies in
 the implementation of programs to put this policy into effect; and

    
 (e) To encourage all institutions of elementary, secondary, and higher 
education, where appropriate, to include Native American languages in 
the curriculum in the same manner as foreign languages and to grant 
proficiency in Native American languages the same full academic credit 
as proficiency in foreign languages;

     (7) Establishing a 
first peoples' language, culture, and oral tribal traditions 
certification program is consistent with the intent of presidential 
executive order number 13336 from 2004, entitled "American Indian and 
Alaska native education," to assist students in meeting the challenging 
student academic standards of the no child left behind act of 2001 (P.L.
 107-110) in a manner that is consistent with tribal traditions, 
languages, and cultures."  [2007 c 319 § 1.]     Short title -- 2007 c 319:
  "This act may be known and cited as the "First peoples' language, 
culture, and oral tribal traditions teacher certification act:  Honoring
 our ancestors.""  [2007 c 319 § 4.]
I hope some of this is helpful.  Best wishes to you!!

Haley

"Language is not merely a body of vocabulary or a set of grammatical rules.  It is a flash of the human spirit, the means by which the soul of each particular culture reaches into the material world.  Every language is an old-growth forest of the mind, a watershed of thought, an entire ecosystem of spiritual possibilities."

Wade Davis

--- On Wed, 9/15/10, Bernadette Santamaria <bernisantamaria at GMAIL.COM> wrote:

From: Bernadette Santamaria <bernisantamaria at GMAIL.COM>
Subject: [ILAT] Request
To: ILAT at LISTSERV.ARIZONA.EDU
Date: Wednesday, September 15, 2010, 12:39 PM

All:
 
For a community-level language committee, a goal is to get the local school board to support Apache language teaching in the schools here in addition to the educational outreach we are attempting to get the older generations to re-learn and make decisions to once again teach the younger generation our language.  One issue is that due to administrative staff changes (school supt, principals, etc), there has not been continuation in these efforts by local language teachers at schools and the new administrators (gathered from recent presentations they did to the Tribal Council) seem to not exclude local language/culture teaching from the school curriculae.

 
In order to present this committee's recommendations to include these courses and to strengthen support of local language teachers in the school system, it was deemed that we need to convince these newer school administrators of the importance of providing this teachings for our children in local schools who comprise over 90% enrollment of native children in them.  We request names of books, articles, authors, etc. that you can provide us that emphasize the reasons why and how native children benefit from inclusion of their native language/cultural knowledge in school curriculae, need examples of tribes/schools that are successful, etc.

 
Thanks for any info provided on this topic.
 
Bernadette A. SantaMaria
WM Apache Language Committee



      
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