Indian Education lacks support, educators testify

RIVERTON — Nine years after the Wyoming State Legislature passed the Indian Education for All Act, education experts testified last week that there is still more work to be done.

"I think [Indian Education for All] is a key priority across the state. Having grown up in Wyoming as a Native student in an off-reservation school, there was never a priority about learning about either tribe. And I still see that today – and I'm well into my 50s. So I think we need to push more," Fremont County School District #21 Superintendent Deb Smith told the Select Committee on Tribal Relations during its meeting in Riverton last week. "As a Native person, we shouldn't always have to be the one advocating on behalf of our tribes. People that are Wyomingites should know. They should be sharing that great history."

"When there are questions on our state assessment that are geared towards Indian Ed. for All, then I'll know that we've taken it serious. I feel like I have yet to see that," Fremont County School District #14 Superintendent Blakke Bertram said. 

The legislature, he pointed out, recently passed new requirements for literacy education – and backed it up with grant funds and rulemaking. 

"So when we say something's important, when we put support and money behind it, we're saying it's important,” he said. “Have we really done that for Indian Ed. for All?"

It can also be difficult for students to access Shoshone and Arapaho language classes – especially enough successive years of Shoshone or Arapaho to qualify for the highest tier of the Hathaway scholarship, Fremont County School District #25 Native American Education Director Roy Brown explained. 

Part of that, he and Fremont County School District #38 Superintendent David Holbert noted, has to do with a lack of qualified teachers. 

Riverton has only ever offered one year of Arapaho language, Brown explained, which means that students that want to take Arapaho can't meet the high-tier Hathaway requirement of two successive years of a foreign language unless they actually take three years of foreign languages.

There are very few available and certified teachers of the Arapaho language, the group of superintendents explained – and even fewer for Shoshone.

Scotty Ratliff, a member of the Wyoming Department of Education's relatively new Native American Education Cabinet and a former legislator, argued that the WDE could do more to provide districts with resources, teaching materials, and curriculum to help support the implementation of Indian Education for All statewide.

Not every school in Wyoming, he pointed out, is close enough to the Wind River Reservation to have easy access to tribal experts.

Bertram also challenged the current standards for Indian Education for All implementation, even in schools close to the reservation. 

"My kids, they go to a neighboring school district, an off-reservation school district. I've seen the work that's going toward Indian Ed. for All in that school district … it is not teaching my daughter, my son, about what Indian Ed. for All stands for and what it means to be a Northern Arapaho or Eastern Shoshone tribal member on our reservation," he told the committee. "We're talking coloring tipis. That's the kind of stuff we're seeing on our off-reservation schools when it comes to Indian Ed. for All. And that's a border school."

Bertram said that if the district in question had called, his district would likely be willing to work with them to share resources.

Representatives from Fremont County School District #1 were not present at the Tribal Relations meeting, but they sat down for an interview at a later date. 

"I appreciate his passion," Fremont County School District #1 Native American Liaison Lisa McCart said of Bertram's remarks. However, she added, the superintendents at Fremont County school districts meet monthly, and she isn't aware of any concerns along those lines having been raised at any of those meetings.

McCart and FCSD#1 Curriculum Director Deidre Meyer explained some of the ways Lander schools work to incorporate Indian Education for All into Lander's curriculum, including reservation tours, cultural events, and the incorporation of Native American literature, history, and legal texts into classes from kindergarten through 12th grade. 

For example, a few years ago McCart worked to bring musician and artist Gabriel Ayala, a member of the Yaqui tribe of Arizona, to Lander schools. Ayala worked with a variety of grade levels, McCart described, including teaching kids at Gannett Peak Elementary about the meanings of different symbols in Yaqui culture through an activity that involved the elementary students selecting symbols that would be meaningful to their family and drawing them on a tipi.

The Indian Education for All Act requires that the state take another look at its social studies standards related to the act every nine years. 

Last updated in 2018, the state is currently in the process of putting together those new standards, WDE Native American Liaison Rob Black told the committee. Meyer, who worked in the Montana Office of Indian Education for years before moving to Lander, is among several Fremont County educators represented on the committee working on those standards revisions.

This story was published on June 24, 2026. 

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