Calvin Hatch's "white" appearance made it easy for him to blend in at school.

"But when they found out I was Native, the expectations immediately lowered," Hatch told a civil rights panel Wednesday. "All of a sudden it was OK I was achieving at a lower level."

Hatch, an attorney, told the Utah Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights at Horizonte Instruction and Training Center that educational equality is key to bringing up American Indian youths' self-esteem and performance.

The local panel will review Wednesday's public testimony on inequities American Indians face, from access to health care to dealing with law enforcement to education, then will make recommendations to the commission on policies at the federal, state, local and tribal level. The meeting is part of a regional effort to address American Indian civil rights.

The panel heard stories of youths who are failing at life and turning to drugs and crime, because of an instance of discrimination that led to their alienation.

"I know the expectations placed on Native youths at this point and time are lower than the expectations of their counterparts," Hatch said.

American Indian children face obstacles that range from a lack of cultural understanding in the classroom to their own parents' negative experience holding them back from participating, the panel was told.

"We are appalled by the statistics on American Indian students," said Nola Lodge, a University of Utah education culture professor and a member of the Coalition of Minority Advisory Committee to the State Board of Education.

Lisana Red Bear, who is Apache and Chicana, did not want to become one of those statistics.

As a student at North Ogden Junior High School, she presented an anatomically correct drawing of the brain to her art teacher.

"He told me that I must have traced it and that I had no artistic ability," she said.

Red Bear went on to receive a college education and obtain a master's degree in Colorado. She is also an internationally recognized Native American artist.

She now works as a certified human rights educator and strives to help her 13-year-old son through the same education gauntletgantlet.

Lodge said a task force is working on recommendations to improve education for American Indian students, who she said face stereotypes such as that all American Indians are rich from casinos, or freeloaders, or alcoholics.

She said Title 7 federal funding for American Indian children is often improperly used, and parents often aren't involved because they don't feel welcome at schools after their own negative educational experience.