Native American students are missing school at higher rates, and the situation has gotten worse during the pandemic
SAN CARLOS, Ariz. — After missing 40 days of school last year, 10-year-old Tommy Betom is on track to do much better this year presence. The importance of showing up was repeatedly emphasized at school – and at home.
When he went to school last year, he often came home saying the teacher picked on him and the other kids made fun of his clothes. But Tommy’s grandmother, Ethel Marie Betom, who became one of his caregivers after his parents separated, said she told him to choose his friends carefully and to behave in class.
He must go to school for his future, she tells him.
“I didn’t have everything,” said Betom, an enrolled member of the San Carlos Apache Tribe. Tommy attends school on the tribe’s reservation in southeastern Arizona. “You have everything. You have running water in the house, a toilet and a running car.
A teacher and truancy officer also contacted Tommy’s family to inquire about his attendance. He was one among many. In the San Carlos Unified School District, 76% of students were chronically absent during the 2022-2023 school year, meaning they missed 10% or more of the school year.
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This story is part of a collaboration on chronic truancy among Native American students between The Associated Press and ICT, a news outlet that covers Native issues.
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Years after COVID-19 disrupted America’s schools, almost every state still is struggling with attendance. But attendance has been worse for Native American students — a disparity that existed before the pandemic and has since grown, according to data collected by The Associated Press.
Of the 34 states with available data for the 2022-2023 school year, half had absenteeism rates for American Indian and Alaska Native students that were at least 9 percentage points higher than the state average .
Many schools serving Indigenous students are working to strengthen connections with families, who often struggle with higher rates of disease and poverty. Schools also must contend with distrust that dates back to the U.S. government’s campaign to break down Native American culture, language and identity by forcing children to commit abuse. boarding schools.
The story “may lead them to not view investing in a public school education as a good use of their time,” said Dallas Pettigrew, director of the Center for Tribal Social Work at the University of Oklahoma and a member of the Cherokee Nation.
The San Carlos school system recently introduced health centers that partner with hospitals, dentists and food banks to provide services to students at multiple schools. The work is guided by cultural success coaches – school employees who help families address challenges that keep students from coming to school.
Nearly 100 percent of the district’s students are indigenous, and more than half of the families have incomes below the federal poverty level. Many students come from homes dealing with alcoholism and drug addiction, Superintendent Deborah Dennison said.
Students are missing 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. Acknowledging their fears, grief and trauma helps him connect with students, he said.
“You feel better, you do better,” Jones said. “It’s our job here at the health center to help students feel better.”
In the 2023-2024 school year, the district’s chronic absenteeism rate fell from 76% to 59% — an improvement Dennison attributes in part to efforts to meet the needs of their communities.
“All of these connections to the community and the tribe are what make the difference for us and make the school a system that works for them rather than something that has been imposed on them, as has been the case for more than a century of education in Indian Country,” said Dennison, a member of the Navajo Nation.
In three states – Alaska, Nebraska and South Dakota – the majority of American Indian and Alaska Native students were chronically absent. In some states, it continued to get worse, even improving slightly for other students, such as in Arizona, where chronic absenteeism among indigenous students increased from 22% in 2018-2019 to 45% in 2022- 2023.
AP’s analysis does not include data on schools operated by the U.S. Bureau of Indian Education, which are not operated by traditional districts. Less than 10% of Native American students attend BIE schools.
At Algodones Elementary School, which serves a handful of Native American pueblos along New Mexico’s Upper Rio Grande, about two-thirds of the students are chronically absent.
Communities have been hit hard by COVID-19, with devastating consequences for seniors. Since schools reopened, students have been slow to return. Justified absences for sick days are still piling up – in some cases, principal Rosangela Montoya suspects, students are stressed about fall behind academically.
Staff and tribal liaisons analyzed each absence and emphasized connections with parents. From 10 a.m., telephone calls are sent to the homes of absent students. Next steps include in-person meetings with the parents of these students.
“There is illness. There’s trauma,” Montoya said. “Many of our grandparents are the ones who raise the children so the parents can work.”
About 95 percent of Algodones students are Native American, and the school works to affirm their identities. It does not open the four days set aside for Native American ceremonial gatherings, and students are excused for absences on other cultural days designated by neighboring pueblos.
For Jennifer Tenorio, it makes a difference that the school offers classes in the family’s native language, Keres. She speaks Keres at home, but says it’s not always enough to become fluent.
Tenorio said his two oldest children, now in their 20s, were discouraged from speaking Keres when they were enrolled in the federal Head Start educational program — a system that now promotes the preservation of native language – and that they had academic difficulties.
“It was sad to see with my own eyes,” said Tenorio, a single parent and administrative assistant who used the school food bank. “At Algodones, I saw a big difference in how much the teachers were actually there for the students and for all the kids, to help them learn.”
On a recent school day, over a lunch of strawberry milk and enchiladas, her 8-year-old son, Cameron Tenorio, said he loved math and wanted to become a police officer .
“He’s inspired,” Tenorio said. “He tells me every day what he learns.”
In Arizona, Nicholas Ferro, principal of Rice Middle School, said better communication with families, including Tommy Betom’s, has helped improve attendance. Since many parents don’t have a working phone, he said, that often means home visits.
Lillian Curtis said she was impressed with Rice Intermediate’s student activities at Family Home Evening. Her granddaughter, Brylee Lupe, 10, missed 10 days of school in mid-October last year, but had only missed two days at the same time this year.
“The kids still want to go – they can’t wait to go to school now. And Brylee is a lot more excited,” said Curtis, who cares for her grandchildren.
Curtis said she told Brylee that skipping school wasn’t an option.
“I just told him you need to go to school, because who’s going to support you?” » said Curtis. “You have to do it yourself. You have to make something of yourself.
The district has made progress because it is changing the perception of the school and what it can offer, said Dennison, the superintendent. Her efforts have improved not only attendance but also morale, especially at the high school, she said.
“Education used to be a weapon for the American government,” she said. “We are working to decolonize our school system.”
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Lee reported from Santa Fe, New Mexico, and Lurye reported from New Orleans. Alia Wong of the Associated Press and Felix Clary of ICT contributed to this report.
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