Some schools not cooperating with Education Dept.

By Karen Francis
Diné Bureau

WINDOW ROCK — The Navajo Nation Council’s Education Committee discussed the possibility of rescinding the re-authorization legislations for some schools that are not cooperating with the Dept. of Diné Education as it tries to implement the Diné Sovereignty in Education Act.

With that act, the nation exerted its authority over education for its students with the intent of closing the achievement gap by using Navajo-specific standards and developing a measurement tool for student achievement.

When legislators passed the act in July 2005, there seemed to be no doubt that when it came time to implement, the schools on the reservation would resist giving in to Navajo Nation authority.

Meeting AYP
Now more than two years later, some of the schools are not co-operating with the department. Many of the tenets of the act have yet to be implemented, and a majority of schools are not meeting adequate yearly progress.

Dr. Kalvin White, from the Office of Diné Science, Math and Technology, presented to the Navajo Nation Council’s Education Committee Jan. 11 on the status of adequate yearly progress for schools on Navajo.

White first updated the committee on overall statistics for the 2007 school year. He said that of the schools on the Arizona portion of the Navajo Nation, 50 have met AYP and 35 have not. In Utah, 18 schools have met AYP while six didn’t.

For New Mexico and Bureau of Indian Education schools, the numbers are worse. Among the BIE schools, 13 met AYP and 46 did not. In New Mexico, 18 schools met the goal and 68 failed to do so. The statistics do not include private schools.

In his presentation, White noted that stipulations by the committee are not being followed by some schools.
While 17 Bureau of Indian Education schools on the reservation were re-authorized last year as grant schools for three years, some are ignoring the committee’s stipulation that they submit data to the Dept. of Diné Education. Eleven of the schools have made no commitment and three have refused to work with the department, White said.

“When schools do not want to participate… what’s the next step? Where do we go? Do we say go ahead and do what you’ve been doing even though you did not meet AYP for five years or do we say it’s a requirement you participate given that you did not meet AYP?” White asked.

Committee Chairman Andy Ayze, Chinle, questioned if there was a need to revisit the re-authorizations for the schools that were not putting effort into improving.

“Should we recall those schools and revoke their re-authorization and get them on an improvement plan?” Ayze said.

Committee member Willie Tracey, Ganado/Kinlichee, said that the committee learned that the schools were unwilling to relinquish their data when it was developing the school reapportionment plans.

“I think we need to pull all re-authorizations back,” he said.
While committee member Bobby Robbins Sr. made a directive for all schools to submit their data to the Dept. of Diné Education, Tracey went further and made a directive that staff would begin to look at the re-authorization legislations of the schools re-authorized last year.

Tracey also noted there is a need to revise the re-authorization application to require that the schools submit their data to the department.

“No ands, if and buts, they need to work with DODE,” he said.

The department is seeking data from all schools on Navajo to help develop standards and curricula for the entire nation.

White also asked the committee for guidance on its stipulation to those schools that received re-authorization to increase the amount of student proficiency by 10 percent.

There were three different interpretations of the 10 percent stipulation, White said, and the department needed to know which interpretation the committee, as well as the Navajo Board of Education, had intended.

One option for the increase was to use the number of those not proficient to determine how many would comprise 10 percent. Another option was to use the number of those proficient. However, White’s recommendation was to use the total student population to calculate the 10 percent increase.

Using the total student population results yields the highest expectations for most of the schools.

Tracey asked about who is monitoring the schools to check if they are establishing the 10 percent gain.

White said that was a question for the Navajo Nation to address. He said the department currently monitors the schools but runs into difficulties when the schools do not provide data.

“We’re monitoring but when they say no, then where do we go?” he said.

White noted that even if the schools increase proficiency by 10 percent using any of the numbers, there is still a large gap between that and what is expected for proficiency.

“So when they come back for re-authorization, they’re still going to be below proficiency,” he said.

The committee members agreed that the intent of the 10 percent stipulation was for schools to increase by 10 percent annually, and not at the end of the three-year re-authorization period.