The

of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, OIE programs touch the lives of more Indian children and adults in this country than any other federal education program. The Council has consistently recommended that the Office of Indian Education be reestablished as an independent division within the structure of the Department of Education with the Director of OIE upgraded to an Assistant Secretary to report directly to the Secretary of Education. The Council believes that this placement would afford Indian education the attention it deserves. We do not believe that an Assistant Secretary's position would be left with individuals in an acting capacity for five out of seven years. original Indian Education Act in 1972 established OIE as a bureau under the direction of the Commissioner of Education and to be headed by a Deputy Commissioner of Indian Education. Of particular importance is the placement of OIE at this bureau level with its deputy reporting directly to the Commissioner, then the highest ranking federal government official in the field of education. The Council's recommendation would put Indian education back at its orginal level of importance. In addition, it is inappropriate for an office with a fellowship program component and an adult education component to fall within the jurisdiction of the Office of Elementary and Secondary Education.

Mr. Chairman, your invitation to present testimony indicated that this hearing would also focus on other Department of Education programs outside of OIE which benefit American Indians and Native Hawaiians. The statutory charge of the National Advisory Council on Indian Education does not include education issues affecting Native Hawaiians, but it does include Indians and

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Alaska Natives. As indicated in the first paragraphs of this document, the Council is charged with providing advice to the Secretary and recommendations to the Congress regarding education programs in which Indian children and adults participate or from which they can benefit. The Council staff has identified a number of Department of Education programs in which our constituent population is participating, and we have included a chart of such programs in our fiscal year 1988 annual report. We have provided this chart to your staff and have mailed it to our entire mailing list. We have also begun a bigger project to review federal education programs in which Indians participating, determine impediments to such participation, develop recommendations to ensure Indian and Alaska Native access to such programs, as appropriate. Additionally, the Council held in early October

are not

and

five two-hour issues sessions at the National Indian Education Association Conference to hear from Indian and Alaska Native people the problems and issues facing them in education. Issues sessions were held on public school concerns, BIA/tribal school concerns, tribal college concerns, adult and

Vocational-technical

education concerns, and higher education and

scholarships. We will shortly be compiling a summary of these sessions, which we will distribute to the Administration, the Select Committee, and other appropriate Congressional committees. Consequently, we have recent input from Indian and Alaska Native people regarding these programs and some current Indian/Alaska Native participation or lack thereof.

sense of

The participants in our public school issues session were concerned with the use by school districts of Indian Education Act formula grant-funded staff

to provide guidance and counseling services and often as truant officers or attendance officers. This is a basic supplanting issue with school districts apparently using this staff which is to provide supplemental education services to perform duties for which the school district should pay. Consequently, this again goes back to the need for monitoring of the grants by OIE staff. We also received a telephone call just this week from a Houma Indian from Louisiana who indicated that the school district in Theriot has told its Indian parent committee members that they are only advisory and do not have to sign off on the grant application and that the school district can spend the Indian Education Act funds as it sees fit.

Other concerns from the issues session indicate that Indian and Alaska

Native people are, for the most part, unaware of the special impact aid provisions for school districts that claim entitlements based on the number of children residing on Indian lands. Consequently, the Impact Aid Office should provide additional technical assistance to tribes on how to assert their rights under the regulations for tribal officials and parents of Indian children to actively consult with the school district and regularly be involved in the planning and development of education programs assisted with impact aid funds. The Council will devote part of its next newsletter to this subject.

The BIA/tribal schools session reflected the need for a working and ongoing task force between the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the Department of Education to work out problems which may develop with eligibility of BIA and

18

tribal schools for Department of Education programs.

One of the programs

already identified which exclude Indian children in tribal and BIA schools is the Even Start Program. The impediment to participation is that the eligible entity is a local educational agency (LEA), and the Department of Education has determined that tribal and BIA schools are not LEA's. The tribal school representatives in this session also pointed to the overall problem of their exclusion from the definition of "LEA" for most state-administered federal grant-in-aid programs. While the Council has not yet taken an official position on this issue, it appears that the inclusion of tribes in the definition of "LEA" would put them and their tribally chartered schools in a position to deal, if they so desired, more effectively with the states to get into the state plans and compete for state-administered federal funds for vocational education, adult education, and so forth. Now, for the most part, states can and do exclude tribes and tribal schools from such funds and are able to do so because of the definition in the federal statutes. One caveat raised was that any inclusion in the state program should not put tribes at odds with sovereignty issues with the states. The Council has encouraged the Even Start Program staff and the Office of General Counsel to interpret statutory language to be as inclusive as possible to serve Indian and Alaska Native children. We would appreciate the help of the Committee in this "attitude change" effort with the Administration and other Committees of Congress since we realize that the Select Committee on Indian Affairs will not be able to unilaterally deal with changing this definition to include tribes in general education legislation.

Mr. Chairman, a number of tribal college presidents and representatives attended the Council's issues session on tribal college concerns. They were particularly concerned about the dwindling funding sources with Title III Developing Institutions apparently pulling back from tribal colleges, obstructions in research programs and other general grant programs because many such programs are linked to four-year institutions, the futility of counting on funding from the OIE discretionary grant program, the need for teacher training with no such funding available this year from the educational personnel development component of OIE, and the need for operational and construction funds for their college libraries. Mr. Chairman, the Council has heard the colleges' concern regarding teacher training echoed in all of the issues sessions. There is a critical need for Indian and Alaska Native teachers to fill classrooms. The tribal colleges, particularly Sinte Gleska

and Oglala with their baccalaureate degree programs and now with Sinte Gleska's masters program, have worked to bring teacher aides already working in schools forward to receive degrees and take their places as certified teachers of Indian youngsters. The Council recommends that the Office of Indian Education and the Department of Education place a special emphasis in all programs, together with the necessary funds, to address this critical teacher training need.

The adult education and

vocational-technical issues session included

funding concerns with a call for a two percent set-aside for Indian and Alaska Native programs in the federal Adult Education Act. There was also a recommendation that an assessment be conducted of Indian and Alaska Native