Work

Robert A. Roessel Jr. and Navajo Community College: Cross-Cultural Roles of Key Individuals in Its Creation,1951-1989

Year: 2007

Type: article

Abstract: Havighurst presented the results from a national study of American Indian education in their book To Live on This Earth.Based on data obtained by researchers at the University of Chicago in 1972, the authors characterized the general state of Native American education in the following way: "With minor exceptions, the history of Indian education had been primarily the transmission of white American education, little altered, to the Indian child as a one-way process.The institution of the school is one that was imposed by and controlled by the non-Indian society, its pedagogy and curriculum little changed for the Indian children, its goals primarily aimed at removing the child from his aboriginal culture and assimilating him into the dominant white culture." 1 The creation of Navajo Community College (NCC) represented the establishment of a cross-cultural brokerage intended to overcome these assimilationist tendencies and to serve five additional purposes: (1) to give the Navajo people a Navajo-owned and -operated college with a curriculum taught by Navajos to help achieve Navajo educational self-determination in higher education; (2) to make higher education for Navajo college students 25 T. Gregory Barrett is assistant professor and doctoral program coordinator for the Higher Education program at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock (UALR).His current research focuses on organizational behavior and processes influencing the responsible conduct of human subjects research, positive organizational processes and change, college and university fundraising, historically black colleges and universities, faculty diversity, and higher education history with an emphasis in Native American history.Lourene Thaxton is a doctoral candidate in the Higher Education program at UALR.She also serves as a lecturer in UALR's rhetoric and writing program.Her research interests include Native American higher education and the incorporation of critical thinking skills into the undergraduate curriculum.

Source: American Indian Culture and Research Journal

DOI: 10.17953/aicr.31.4.c657400j06654775

Authors: T. Gregory Barrett, Lourene Thaxton

Language: English

Topic: Indigenous Health, Education, and Rights

Subfield: Health

Field: Social Sciences

Domain: Social Sciences

SDG: Quality education

Open Access status: bronze

Funders: American Educational Research Association, Cleveland State University, University of Arkansas

OpenAlex ID: W237912835