Indian Education for All: Decolonizing Indigenous Education in Public Schools. Multicultural Education Series

Overview & Synopsis

In his new book, John P. Hopkins examines recent efforts to reform Indigenous education in public schools. Hopkins centers his critique on Montana State's innovative and bold multicultural education policy called Indian Education for All (IEFA), and demonstrates why Indigenous education reforms must decolonize the curriculum and pedagogy to address the academic inequalities facing Native students. Using tribal critical race theory and culturally sustaining and revitalizing pedagogy, "Indian Education for All" proposes a shift in the ways teacher candidates learn about Indigenous education and instruct Native students. It explains why teachers and schools need to privilege Indigenous knowledge and explicitly integrate decolonization concepts into teaching and learning to address the academic gaps in Native education. This book will also help non-Native educators engage in productive and authentic conversations with tribal communities about what Indigenous education reform should entail. The book features include: (1) Brings together multicultural education research and Native American and Indigenous Studies literature to promote strategies for Indigenous education reform in public schools; (2) Shows how the politics of reconciliation can resolve tensions between public schools and traditional, placed-based Indigenous philosophies, knowledge, values, and cultures; and (3) Provides practical strategies to adequately prepare teachers to instruct Native students and partner with tribal communities.