Engaging Native American Learners with Rigor and Cultural Relevance
In this brief, the Center for Comprehensive School Reform and Improvement presents three strategies to increase Native American student achievement and engagement. The strategies focus on: instructional practices, curriculum content, and school climate.
The authors illustrate each strategy with specific examples from schools supporting a large number of Native American students. Among the examples are the Kamehameha Early Education Program (Hawaii) focusing on early reading skills, Native language instruction in Denver Public Schools, and the Klamath-Trinity (California) college tour program.
The authors clearly define the purposes of this issue brief and support their recommended strategies with solid examples from academic literature. The article could be improved if the authors provided specific evidence that each program resulted in higher student achievement and engagement. Additional examples would also be helpful, although admittedly, this is an issue brief.
Communications quality is excellent. The authors write in a concise, easy to read style. The design is well done.
Utility should be reasonably high, although the article, published in 2009, may be due for an update. Evidence of effectiveness is unknown, but the examples provided and the article’s high communications quality could be helpful to schools and districts serving Native American students.