Sixteen-year-old Raven Casas recalled one English homework assignment when a teacher sent students a link to a website called “Native American Artifacts.” Students had to choose an artifact and write about its symbolism. However, when Casas clicked on the link, he found an image of merchandise promoting his Kansas City Chiefs Pro Football team.

“They had Native American symbols on them and were called Native American artifacts,” she said. “I told him how wrong this was and how offensive this assignment was.”

That’s why Native American students and tribal leaders like Casas are applauding the new law signed into law by Gov. Gavin Newsom last week. It establishes a California Indian Education Act that encourages school districts to work with local Native American tribes to develop history lessons and strategies to bridge academic achievement gaps among Indigenous students. Local school districts then submitted task force work to the state to help California become an authority in serving Native American students.

Tribal leaders believe that better education in Indigenous history not only enriches all students, but also leads to higher high school graduation rates and healthier lives for Native American youth.

“By educating people, we can get out of the shadows,” says Casas. “It sheds light on the true side of things.”

“Educating our people helps us get out of the shadows.”
— Raven Casas, 16

Casas is a member of the San Manuel Band of Mission Indians, a Native American tribe based in San Bernardino County. Casas and her peers say public schools have failed to educate students about tribal history, even though their own ancestry has roots in the area.

Casas said that in exchange for completing the artifact assignment, he submitted a message to teachers educating him about his culture. She said she hasn’t received grades or feedback for assignments. In fact, according to Casas, her teacher never acknowledged her notes to him. She said the new law could help eliminate other under-informed mandates.

“I want to shift the curriculum perspective to a Native American perspective,” Casas said.

Johnny Hernandez, vice president of the San Manuel Band of Mission Indians, who advocated the new law, emphasized the importance of local history.

“This is important because as a nation of California, every tribal community has its own unique cultural identity,” Hernandez says. “It’s important for people to learn about the indigenous peoples in their area.”

The new law was drafted into law by California Rep. James Ramos of Rancho Cucamonga, the only Native American member of the state legislature. The law requires the task force to submit an annual report to the California Department of Education, which in turn submits the report to the Senate and House Boards of Education. Legislators use these reports to inform future policy.

The bill received unanimous support in the state Senate and House of Representatives. The teachers’ union, the California Association of Charter Schools, and the state’s superintendent of public education, Tony Thurmond, all supported the bill.

“We have to start at the local level,” Ramos said. “The goal is to feed that local knowledge into the state so that it can have a clearinghouse for all of California’s cultures.”

Ramos, also a member of the San Manuel tribe, said the bill was long overdue. He remembers one of his teachers asking him and his fellow tribe members to interpret his American drum song, a native of a tribe outside California. He said he was humiliated by his teacher because he didn’t know how to do it.

“We were told to sit down because we shouldn’t be Native Americans,” Ramos said.

Last year, when a Riverside high school teacher wore a fake plume and mimicked Native American chants to explain math concepts, the insensitivity was familiar to Ramos. Today, however, there is enough political momentum to better inform teachers and students and prevent future incidents.

Although the law does not require districts to form ad hoc committees, Hernandez said it was a step in the right direction.

“I hope people are interested in doing the right thing,” he said. “Time will tell, but the tribesmen will never stop fighting for this.”

Hernandez said his tribe is still working on designing course materials for rural districts, but cited the Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla Indians as an example of a tribe that has already developed a curriculum. The Palm Springs-based tribe piloted his third-grade curriculum last year, which teaches students about tribal history, culture and land use.

The hands-on curriculum used real tribal crafts to teach students about local customs. The program was recognized from the Harvard University Project on Native American Economic Development.

Hernandez says that while cultural ignorance can foster caricatures like the events at Liberisde, a thoughtful curriculum helps Native American students develop a “general picture of themselves as tribal people.” It helps to form a point of view. Hernandez hopes stronger identities will also lead to higher high school graduation rates.

The graduation rate for Native American students in 2021 is 73%, lower than for any other racial or ethnic group except black students. Less than a third of her Native American graduates have completed the courses required to enter the University of California or California State University.

Hernandez said better education in one’s own culture and history could have ripple effects outside the classroom, particularly within Native American communities where rates of substance abuse and suicide are disproportionately high. .

“How do you support the whole student body, not just the academic part?” he said. “It’s about looking at the student holistically.”

A richer history curriculum leads to fewer misunderstandings. With fewer misunderstandings, Hernandez says native American students feel like they belong on campus.

“When people think of San Manuel, the only thing that comes to mind is the casino,” he said. “We got the chance to talk about what it means to be a tribal government.”

“When people think of San Manuel, nothing but the casino comes to mind. We have the opportunity to talk about what it means to be a tribal government.”
— Johnny Hernandez, vice president of Mission Indian’s San Manuel Band

Gauge, Hernandez’s 16-year-old son, who traveled to Sacramento to lobby before the bill passed, said his classmates stereotyped Native Americans as wealthy casino owners.

“I feel like this is happening every week or every month,” Gage said. “As a Native American, they think I’m a money machine.”

But Gauge and Casas both want young Californians to know how their people got to where they are today. Some of his Native Americans are genocides and forced evictions that preceded their current successes.

“It’s important in the curriculum to preserve our culture and identity,” says Gauge. “We have to look at it in a better way.”

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