SAN CARLOS, Ariz. (AP) Tommy Betom, 10, is on track for significantly higher attendance this year after missing 40 days of school the previous year. Both at home and at school, the value of being present has been emphasized time and time again.
Last year, he frequently returned home from school complaining that the teacher was making fun of him and that other children were making fun of his attire. However, Ethel Marie Betom, Tommy’s grandmother, who took on some of his care after his parents divorced, claimed to have advised him to conduct well in class and pick his mates wisely.
She informed him that for the sake of his future, he must attend school.
Betom, a registered member of the San Carlos Apache tribe, stated, “I didn’t have everything.” Tommy goes to school in southeast Arizona on the tribe’s reservation. Everything is yours. Your car is running, the bathrooms are running, and the house has running water.
Tommy’s family was also contacted by a teacher and a truancy officer regarding his attendance. He was just one among many. During the 2022–2023 academic year, 76% of students in the San Carlos Unified School District missed 10% or more of class due to chronic absences.
Nearly every state is still having attendance issues years after COVID-19 interrupted American schools. However, according school statistics gathered by The Associated Press, Native American pupils’ attendance has been poorer, a discrepancy that predated the outbreak and has since increased.
For the 2022–2023 school year, absence rates for Native American and Alaska Native students were at least 9 percentage points higher than the state average in half of the 34 states for which data was available.
Numerous educational institutions that educate Native kids have been attempting to improve ties with their families, who frequently face greater rates of poverty and illness. Schools also have to deal with mistrust stemming from the U.S. government’s effort to divide Native American identity, culture, and language by sending them to cruel boarding schools.
According to Dallas Pettigrew, a member of the Cherokee Nation and the director of Oklahoma University’s Center for Tribal Social Work, history may make them question if investing in a public school education is a wise use of their time.
On-site health, trauma care helped bring students back
Recently, the San Carlos school system established care centers that collaborate with food banks, dentists, and hospitals to offer services to children at various schools. Cultural success coaches, who assist families in resolving issues that prevent students from attending school, lead the work.
In the district, almost half of households earn less than the federal poverty threshold, and nearly all of the pupils are Native. According to Superintendent Deborah Dennison, a large number of pupils come from homes that struggle with drug and alcohol misuse.
Students miss school for reasons ranging from anxiety to unstable living conditions, said Jason Jones, a cultural success coach at San Carlos High School and an enrolled member of the San Carlos Apache tribe. He claimed that connecting with students is facilitated by acknowledging their trauma, sadness, and concerns.
Jones said, “You feel better, you do better.” Helping the pupils feel better is our responsibility here at the care facility.
In the 2023-2024 school year, the chronic absenteeism rate in the district fell from 76% to 59% an improvement Dennison attributes partly to efforts to address their communities’ needs.
According to Dennison, a Navajo Nation member, “all these relationships with the community and the tribe are what’s making a difference for us and making the school a system that fits them rather than something that has been forced upon them, like it has been for more than a century of education in Indian Country.”
In three states Alaska, Nebraska, and South Dakota the majority of Native American and Alaska Native students were chronically absent. In some states, it has continued to worsen, even while improving slightly for other students, as in Arizona, where chronic absenteeism for Native students rose from 22% in 2018-2019 to 45% in 2022-2023.
AP s analysis does not include data on schools managed by the U.S. Bureau of Indian Education, which are not run by traditional districts. Less than 10% of Native American students attend BIE schools.
Schools close on days of Native ceremonial gatherings
At Algodones Elementary School, which serves a handful of Native American pueblos along New Mexico s Upper Rio Grande, about two-thirds of students are chronically absent.
The communities were hit hard by COVID-19, with devastating impacts on elders. Since schools reopened, students have been slow to return. Excused absences for sick days are still piling up in some cases, Principal Rosangela Montoya suspects, students are stressed about falling behind academically.
Staff and tribal liaisons have been analyzing every absence and emphasizing connections with parents. By 10 a.m., telephone calls go out to the homes of absent students. Next steps include in-person meetings with those students’ parents.
There s illness. There s trauma, Montoya said. A lot of our grandparents are the ones raising the children so that the parents can be working.
About 95% of Algodones’ students are Native American, and the school strives to affirm their identity. It doesn t open on four days set aside for Native American ceremonial gatherings, and students are excused for absences on other cultural days as designated by the nearby pueblos.
For Jennifer Tenorio, it makes a difference that the school offers classes in the family s native language of Keres. She speaks Keres at home, but says that s not always enough to instill fluency.
Tenorio said her two oldest children, now in their 20s, were discouraged from speaking Keres when enrolled in the federal Head Start educational program a system that now promotes native language preservation and they struggled academically.
It was sad to see with my own eyes, said Tenorio, a single parent and administrative assistant who has used the school s food bank. In Algodones, I saw a big difference to where the teachers were really there for the students, and for all the kids, to help them learn.
Over a lunch of strawberry milk and enchiladas on a recent school day, her 8-year-old son Cameron Tenorio said he likes math and wants to be a policeman.
He s inspired, Tenorio said. He tells me every day what he learns.
Home visits change perception of school
In Arizona, Rice Intermediate School Principal Nicholas Ferro said better communication with families, including Tommy Betom s, has helped improve attendance. Since many parents are without working phones, he said, that often means home visits.
Lillian Curtis said she has been impressed by Rice Intermediate s student activities on family night. Her granddaughter, Brylee Lupe, 10, missed 10 days of school by mid-October last year but had missed just two days by the same time this year.
The kids always want to go they are anxious to go to school now. And Brylee is much more excited, said Curtis, who takes care of her grandchildren.
Curtis said she tells Brylee that skipping school is not an option.
I just told her that you need to be in school, because who is going to be supporting you? Curtis said. You ve got to do it on your own. You got to make something of yourself.
The district has made gains because it is changing the perception of school and what it can offer, said Dennison, the superintendent. Its efforts have helped not just with attendance but also morale, especially at the high school, she said.
Education was a weapon for the U.S. government back in the past, she said. We work to decolonize our school system.
By CHEYANNE MUMPHREY, SHARON LURYE and MORGAN LEE Associated Press. Lee reported from Santa Fe, New Mexico, and Lurye reported from New Orleans. Alia Wong of The Associated Press and Felix Clary ofICTcontributed to this report. This story is part of a collaboration on chronic absenteeism among Native American students between The Associated Press and ICT, a news outlet that covers Indigenous issues.
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