Post by blackcrowheart on Feb 11, 2006 12:51:33 GMT -5
Educators discuss ways to help rural students adjust to urban campuses
By DIANA CAMPBELL
Staff Writer
Thursday, February 09, 2006 - An Alaska Native student who moves to
Anchorage from rural Alaska likely will be overwhelmed when entering the
Anchorage School District just by the sheer size of the schools alone.
And statistics show they face a host of obstacles to academic success,
say educators working against that pressure.
School data show a growing trend of Alaska Native students failing or
dropping out, said Shirley Tuzroyluke, the educational community liaison
with Cook Inlet Tribal Council in Anchorage.
"It's an unbroken pattern," Tuzroyluke told about 30 educators who
attended her "Native Students in Transition" workshop Wednesday as part
of the three-day 32nd Bilingual Multicultural Education/Equity
Conference 2006.
Tuzroyluke was joined by Amy Maitland and dick Thompson, also with CITC.
They outlined the problems of making the transition from rural to urban
schools and the resulting programs that have been developed to solve
them.
Trends show that more rural Alaskans are moving to cities, Tuzroyluke
said. From 1970 to 2000, more than 27,000 Alaska Natives moved from
rural Alaska to Anchorage, Fairbanks, Juneau or other cities.
Native students comprised 13.2 percent of Anchorage's student body in
2000-01, but were 24.76 percent of dropouts, she said.
Part of the problem is that Alaska Native students are exposed to higher
rates of alcohol abuse, poverty and health problems than other
minorities, Tuzroyluke said.
She presented some statistics:
* Those with fetal alcohol syndrome disorder doubled in the 1990s.
* Native children make up a quarter of the state's youth population, but
suffer half the cases of child abuse.
* Sixty-one percent of children in state custody are Native.
* The Native suicide rate has been four times higher than that of whites
in the U.S. since 1996 and Alaska Native boys have the highest suicide
rate in the nation.
* About 25 percent of Alaska Native families live below the poverty
level in rural areas, the highest rate of poverty in the state. Alaska
Natives who live in urban areas come in second at 15 percent.
"In Anchorage it's not only poverty, but extreme poverty," Tuzroyluke
said.
Many of the students she deals with are homeless. She points to welfare
reforms that limit families to five years on public aid. Once the
deadline passes, many are "starting to live in wooded areas and cars,"
she said.
School districts have to deal with the problems because statistics show
that minority school enrollment is growing while white enrollment is
dropping, she said. About 57 percent of Alaska Native/American Indian
students in Anchorage are in preschool through sixth grade with at least
half of their academic years ahead of them.
Thompson outlined a CITC program called Educational Services System that
is combating the problems. The program is divided into seven parts and
includes hands-on school intervention in all grades, job services,
Native Youth Olympics participation, scholarship opportunities and
mentoring.
The school intervention program, called Partners for Success, is aimed
at 800 to 1,000 Native students in seventh to 12th grades. The program
has all-Native extracurricular classes in math and language arts in four
Anchorage high schools and four middle schools.
In the Fairbanks North Star Borough School District, the same sort of
issues are present, said Deseree Wright, the director of Alaska Native
Education.
Minority and low income students fall behind on test scores, according
to Fairbanks school reports.
She said Natives living in villages may not realize how poor they are
because their family can eat moose and fish. And in cases of real need,
the community will know and band together to help.
But families, and children in particular, may get lost in Fairbanks or
other urban settings.
A Fairbanks school will likely hold more people than the child's home
village. And children will often change schools two or three times a
year because families move a lot, Wright said. Moving is usually a sign
of that the family is struggling to find affordable housing.
Helping a student in motion is difficult, she said. The district has a
home liaison who visits families and helps them get into education
services, such as tutoring. The district, in partnership with Doyon
Ltd., also has a program that helps teachers understand different ways
of learning.
"Learning styles are somewhat of a challenge," she said.
That's why the Effie Kokrine Charter School in is in existence,
principal Eleanor Laughlin said. The school offers courses designed for
different learning styles and the students are responding to it.
"They feel like it's a healthy learning environment," Laughlin said.
Diana Campbell can be reached at 459-7523 or dcampbell@newsminer.com .
By DIANA CAMPBELL
Staff Writer
Thursday, February 09, 2006 - An Alaska Native student who moves to
Anchorage from rural Alaska likely will be overwhelmed when entering the
Anchorage School District just by the sheer size of the schools alone.
And statistics show they face a host of obstacles to academic success,
say educators working against that pressure.
School data show a growing trend of Alaska Native students failing or
dropping out, said Shirley Tuzroyluke, the educational community liaison
with Cook Inlet Tribal Council in Anchorage.
"It's an unbroken pattern," Tuzroyluke told about 30 educators who
attended her "Native Students in Transition" workshop Wednesday as part
of the three-day 32nd Bilingual Multicultural Education/Equity
Conference 2006.
Tuzroyluke was joined by Amy Maitland and dick Thompson, also with CITC.
They outlined the problems of making the transition from rural to urban
schools and the resulting programs that have been developed to solve
them.
Trends show that more rural Alaskans are moving to cities, Tuzroyluke
said. From 1970 to 2000, more than 27,000 Alaska Natives moved from
rural Alaska to Anchorage, Fairbanks, Juneau or other cities.
Native students comprised 13.2 percent of Anchorage's student body in
2000-01, but were 24.76 percent of dropouts, she said.
Part of the problem is that Alaska Native students are exposed to higher
rates of alcohol abuse, poverty and health problems than other
minorities, Tuzroyluke said.
She presented some statistics:
* Those with fetal alcohol syndrome disorder doubled in the 1990s.
* Native children make up a quarter of the state's youth population, but
suffer half the cases of child abuse.
* Sixty-one percent of children in state custody are Native.
* The Native suicide rate has been four times higher than that of whites
in the U.S. since 1996 and Alaska Native boys have the highest suicide
rate in the nation.
* About 25 percent of Alaska Native families live below the poverty
level in rural areas, the highest rate of poverty in the state. Alaska
Natives who live in urban areas come in second at 15 percent.
"In Anchorage it's not only poverty, but extreme poverty," Tuzroyluke
said.
Many of the students she deals with are homeless. She points to welfare
reforms that limit families to five years on public aid. Once the
deadline passes, many are "starting to live in wooded areas and cars,"
she said.
School districts have to deal with the problems because statistics show
that minority school enrollment is growing while white enrollment is
dropping, she said. About 57 percent of Alaska Native/American Indian
students in Anchorage are in preschool through sixth grade with at least
half of their academic years ahead of them.
Thompson outlined a CITC program called Educational Services System that
is combating the problems. The program is divided into seven parts and
includes hands-on school intervention in all grades, job services,
Native Youth Olympics participation, scholarship opportunities and
mentoring.
The school intervention program, called Partners for Success, is aimed
at 800 to 1,000 Native students in seventh to 12th grades. The program
has all-Native extracurricular classes in math and language arts in four
Anchorage high schools and four middle schools.
In the Fairbanks North Star Borough School District, the same sort of
issues are present, said Deseree Wright, the director of Alaska Native
Education.
Minority and low income students fall behind on test scores, according
to Fairbanks school reports.
She said Natives living in villages may not realize how poor they are
because their family can eat moose and fish. And in cases of real need,
the community will know and band together to help.
But families, and children in particular, may get lost in Fairbanks or
other urban settings.
A Fairbanks school will likely hold more people than the child's home
village. And children will often change schools two or three times a
year because families move a lot, Wright said. Moving is usually a sign
of that the family is struggling to find affordable housing.
Helping a student in motion is difficult, she said. The district has a
home liaison who visits families and helps them get into education
services, such as tutoring. The district, in partnership with Doyon
Ltd., also has a program that helps teachers understand different ways
of learning.
"Learning styles are somewhat of a challenge," she said.
That's why the Effie Kokrine Charter School in is in existence,
principal Eleanor Laughlin said. The school offers courses designed for
different learning styles and the students are responding to it.
"They feel like it's a healthy learning environment," Laughlin said.
Diana Campbell can be reached at 459-7523 or dcampbell@newsminer.com .