Meeting student needs presents a challenge

At Ibapah Elementary, a Title I school near the Goshute Indian Reservation in western Utah, officials have worked hard to make progress under daunting circumstances.

About 60 percent of students are American Indian. The school has a 95 percent poverty rate and 35 percent turnover as students come in and move away. It is also profoundly isolated.

Experiences beyond the classroom are limited. There is no library or symphony, one teacher said. In some neighborhoods, schooling is a supplement to a child's education. To these children, it is their education.

Literacy and education are not promoted in some Indian homes.

Seltzer surveyed the 230 Navajo students at Monument Valley. In 1998, 80 percent had no running water or electricity. In 2005, 40 percent lived under the same circumstances. Today, few have Internet access.

This is where a stronger economy comes in, Seltzer said.

"I truly believe the academic levels would be soaring right now if the economic development allowed for our students to stay here and raise their families," Seltzer said.

Outside of tourism and working for the Navajo tribal government, there really isn't much opportunity for young people.

High school graduates move away because there is no work. Few return to start businesses.

"The underlying feeling among parents is that if their kids do well, they will leave. They don't say that out loud, but that's what they truly believe."

Tourism and tribal services only job opportunities, she said. But cCollege is the key to success, she said, and 40 to 50 percent of her last graduating class is going on to college. "I don't know how they're going to survive, but they are going," she said.

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