Indian Education and the Benefits of Tribally-Owned Businesses
There are currently more than 1.1 million American Indians and Alaska Natives under the age of 24. The Bureau of Indian Education (BIE), a subagency of the Bureau of Indian Affairs in the Department of the Interior, educates more than 42,000 students each year through 59 schools (with another 124 schools funded with BIE grants). The amount of Native Americans graduating college has more than doubled in the past 30 years, and there are now 32 tribal colleges and universities training more than 30,000 students with the goal of issuing 5,000 degrees per year by 2020.
Despite significant advances in Indian education in the past century, Native Americans still lag behind their peers in almost every measurable metric of attainment. Native student populations are plagued by high dropout rates, dilapidated facilities, and a maze of federal bureaucracy that interrupts school management and operations. The Department of Education, the federal agency charged with ensuring all children have an equal access to education, has little to no interest in assisting Native students. With so much against them, some Native youth are finding ways to succeed, but many tribal communities struggle to provide recent graduates with job opportunities and local services.
Issues like substance abuse and suicide, all too frequent problems on reservations, have been linked to low educational attainment. While some place the failures of Indian education squarely on the federal government and its trust responsibilities, NAFSA members are using revenues from tribal lending enterprises (TLE) to improve educational outcomes in their communities. TLE revenues helped the Otoe-Missouria Tribe hire more educators, add additional classrooms, and purchase books for its Head Start program, a program that provides low income families with early childhood education opportunities. Revenues from a Chippewa Cree TLE help fund a scholarship program at the local tribal college and establish a financial literacy program at a high school on the reservation. Tribal lending revenues are stepping in where federal agencies are failing Native children.
Indian education has come so far since the old Native boarding school philosophy of “kill the Indian, save the child.” Schools are now teaching more culturally-appropriate curriculum, and Native students are earning more college degrees than ever. However, without opportunities at home after graduation and continued investment in student development, reservations will never live up their potential. Through responsible and sustainable tribal economic development like the e-commerce operations of NAFSA members, tribes will move one step closer to self-sufficiency and a world of opportunity for future generations.
