SAN CARLOS, Ariz. — After missing 40 days of school last year, 10-year-old Tommy Betom is doing much better this year. assistance. The importance of showing up at school and at home has been repeatedly emphasized.
When she went to school last year, she often came home saying she was picking on the teacher and the other kids were making fun of her clothes. But Tommy’s grandmother Ethel Marie Betom, who became one of his caretakers after his parents separated, said he was told to choose his friends carefully and behave in class.
He has to go to school for the sake of his future, he told her.
“I didn’t have everything,” said Betom, an enrolled member of the San Carlos Apache tribe. Tommy attends a tribal reservation school in southeastern Arizona. “You have everything. At home you have water, toilets and a running car.’
A teacher and an truancy officer also contacted Tommy’s family to correct his attendance. It was one of 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 partnership between The Associated Press and ICT, a news outlet covering Native American issues, on chronic absenteeism among Native American students.
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Years after COVID-19 shut down America’s schools, almost every state still is struggling with attendance. But attendance has been worse for American students — a disparity that existed before the pandemic and has grown since, according to data compiled by The Associated Press.
Of the 34 states with data available for the 2022-2023 school year, half had absenteeism rates for Native American and Alaska Native students that were 9 percentage points higher than the state average.
Many schools serving Indigenous students have been working to strengthen relationships with families, who often struggle with higher standards. the disease and poverty Schools must also navigate mistrust from the US government’s campaign to destroy Native American culture, language and identity by forcing children to abuse them. boarding schools.
History “can cause them to not see their investment in 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 care centers that partner with hospitals, dentists and food banks to provide services to students at various schools. The work is led by cultural success coaches—school staff who help families address the challenges that prevent students from coming to school.
Nearly 100% of the district’s students are local and more than half of the families have incomes below the federal poverty level. Many students come from homes plagued by alcoholism and drug abuse, Superintendent Deborah Dennison said.
Students miss school for reasons ranging from anxiety to unstable living conditions, said Jason Jones, 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 her connect with students, she said.
“You feel better, you do better,” Jones said. “That’s our job here at the care center to help students feel better.”
In the 2023-2024 school year, the district’s chronic absenteeism rate dropped from 76 percent to 59 percent — an improvement that Dennison attributes in part to their efforts to respond to the needs of their communities.
“It’s all these connections to the community and the tribe that make the difference for us and make it a system that fits these schools, rather than something that’s been forced, as Indian country education has been for over a century,” said Dennison, a member of the Navajo Nation.
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, although it has improved slightly for other students, including Arizona, where chronic absenteeism among Native students rose 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 several Native American villages along New Mexico’s Upper Rio Grande, about two-thirds of the students are chronically absent.
The community was hit hard by COVID-19, and it had a devastating impact on seniors. Since schools reopened, students have been slow to return. Excused absences sick days they’re still piling up—in some cases, principal Rosangela Montoya suspects, the students are stressed falling behind academically
Staff and tribal liaisons have been reviewing all absences and emphasizing connections with parents. By 10 in the morning, phone calls are made to the homes of absent students. The next steps are face-to-face meetings with the parents of these students.
“There is sickness. There is trauma,” Montoya said. “Many of our grandparents are raising children so that their parents can be at work.”
About 95% of Algodones’ students are Native American, and the school strives to affirm their identity. It does not open on the four days set aside for Native American ceremonial gatherings, and students justify their absence on other cultural days designated by nearby towns.
For Jennifer Tenorio, it is very important that the school offers classes in the family’s Keres language. He speaks Keres at home, but says that this is not always enough to give him fluency.
Tenorio said her two oldest children, now in their 20s, were reluctant to speak Keres when they enrolled in the federal Head Start education program — now a system that promotes mother tongue preservation — and struggled academically.
“It was sad to see it with my own eyes,” said Tenorio, a single parent and administrative assistant who has used the school’s food bank. “At Algodones, I saw a big difference that the teachers were really there to help the students, and all the children, 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 police officer.
“He’s inspired,” Tenorio said. “Every day he tells me what he learns.”
In Arizona, Rice Intermediate School Principal Nicholas Ferro said better communication with families, including Tommy Betom, has helped improve attendance. Since many parents are without a work phone, she said, that often means home visits.
Lillian Curtis said she was impressed by the activities of Rice Intermediate students during family night. Her granddaughter, Brylee Lupe, 10, missed 10 days of school by mid-October last year, but missed just two days at the same time this year.
“The kids always want to go; now they’re excited to go to school. And Brylee is so much more excited,” said Curtis, who takes care of her grandchildren.
Curtis said she tells Brylee that skipping school is not an option.
“I told him you have to be in school because who’s going to help you?” said Curtis. “You have to do it for yourself. You have to do something about yourself.’
The district has made gains because it is changing the perception of the school and what it can offer, said Dennison, the superintendent. His efforts have helped not only with attendance, but also with morale, especially in high school, he said.
“Education was a weapon for the US government in the past,” he said. “We work to decolonize our school system.”
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Lee reported from Santa Fe, New Mexico, and Lury reported from New Orleans. Alia Wong of The Associated Press and Felix Clary of IKT contributed to this report.
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