INDIGENOUS INGENUITY:
“Reforming Indigenous School Systems by Reconciling
Western Knowledge with Indigenous Wisdom for
Enhanced Student Success.”
What is Indigenous Ingenuity, LLC?
Since the late 1800s, as a means of colonizing and assimilating Indigenous people, formal education was imposed on most Indian tribes through treaties with the federal government. Consequently, many school systems are still experiencing challenges with purposeful, meaningful, and connected relevance for student learning thus lacking systemic design flaws and balance to better meet the needs of Indigenous students, families, and tribal communities.
While much research has focused on issues within Indian education and the government's failures, few studies address ways to improve the academic achievement of Indigenous students. In his book 'Indian Education in America' (1994), Vine Deloria Jr. emphasizes the urgent need to reform school systems to better meet the academic needs of Indigenous children.
Understanding the history of Indian education is crucial for addressing issues within school systems and the persistent lack of improvement for too many Indigenous students and schools that continue to exist today.
INDIGENOUS INGENUITY, LLC strives to reform school systems predominantly serving Indigenous students by strategically planning, and incorporating Indigenous wisdom to align with Western research-based effective school correlates across all aspects of learning—that which has been historically overlooked in Western education alone for Indigenous people and communities.
A Simplified Version: It's time for school leaders to confront the harsh reality of low academic performance and high dropout rates among Indigenous students. We must take charge of our school systems to ensure a brighter future for Indigenous students, people, tribal communities, and the dual and multicultural societies we all live.
As school systems strategically plan to become more culturally responsive to meet the learning needs of Indigenous students, there's an opportunity to integrate Indigenous values and wisdom with Western education concepts, allowing education systems to become more connected, purposeful, meaningful, and relevant to Indigenous students, their families, communities, and way of life.
What makes INDIGENOUS INGENUITY, LLC different?
Our Leader, Dr. Deborah Jackson-Dennison, founder and Chief Executive Officer of Indigenous Ingenuity, LLC earned a Doctorate in Education from Arizona State University in 2001 by successfully conducting her dissertation study on this subject of Indian Education reform titled, "Perceptions of Effectiveness in Navajo Nation Public High Schools and Student Achievement."
Dr. Jackson-Dennison, the daughter of the late, Dr. Dean Chee Jackson, a well-respected Navajo educational leader himself, strives to continue her father’s legacy of integrating and correlating Western educational concepts and knowledge with Indigenous wisdom to bring about greater relevancy, meaning, and most importantly, ownership to the otherwise foreign school systems that have historically failed too many Indian people.
As a Navajo woman educator and school leader now for over 30 years, Dr. Dennison has seen firsthand how school systems that serve Indigenous students urgently need reforms. It's time to make meaningful changes to how we organize and deliver education to Indigenous students, making sure all aspects of our system connect better with tribal and community values and ways of life. Without relevancy, teaching and learning is simply a mote exercise.
Indigenous Ingenuity, LLC designed a research-based instrument and survey tool called “Reconciliation of Knowledge & Wisdom” (RKW). This instrument was developed to help evaluate schools serving Tribal communities by developing a strategic plan that is well-balanced and inclusive of tribal wisdom as a meaningful and relevant source of knowledge equal to Western education concepts.
The RKW instrument helps schools that serve Indigenous students, whether Public, Private, or Bureau of Indian Education, Tribally controlled Grant Schools, better understand how well their teaching practices and organization work. It brings together knowledge from both Western academia and Indigenous wisdom to create a stronger connection within tribal communities. This instrument is not used for evaluating staff, but to assess how well school systems that predominantly serve Indigenous students are designed to meet the learning needs of the students being served.
Dr. Dennison has always strived to improve the quality of school systems, building off the legacy of her late father, she started with Chinle Unified School District, as the federal projects director. Her time as a superintendent at two large Navajo Nation public school districts in Window Rock and Ganado, Arizona, as well as at the San Carlos Unified School District on the. San Carlos Apache nation also contributed to improving the research-based RKW school assessment model.
Our Services
Indigenous Ingenuity, LLC is able to provide assistance in the area of expertise of Indian Education Reform.