From Creation to Cultural Resistance and Expansion: Research on American Indian Higher Education

Abstract

The current literature on American Indian access and persistence indicates that historical forces still play a key role in whether American Indians graduate from college or not. Historically, education for American Indians in the U.S. was used for Christianization, assimilation, and cultural termination. Nevertheless, some American Indian tribes promoted college education, either at Predominantly White Institutions (PWI’s) or tribally controlled, to their members beginning in the mid-1800s. On the heels of the civil rights movement, most American Indian tribes pushed for culturally appropriate higher education for their individual tribal members. Beginning in the late 1960s, Tribal Colleges and Universities (TCU’s) were established to provide American Indian college students with culturally relevant support centered around each student’s tribal culture, family, language, and learning needs. Today, PWI’s are beginning to partner with TCU’s to further the college education access to American Indians by incorporating distant and other technologies.