When Dwight Carlston of Fort Defiance, Ariz., began his college career a few years ago, little did he know that he was doing a lot more than making his family proud by pursuing a college education.
While setting an example for his family, Carlston, now a 25-year-old environmental science major at Navajo Technical College with a 3.8 grade point average, was also helping tribal colleges throughout the continent in their efforts to get more American Indian males on reservations to further their education.
The ambitious efforts to recruit American Indian males are working, despite an abundance of hurdles, including lack of money to pay for college, few peer and mentor incentives, and important family obligations that don’t seem to leave much time for pursuits like college.
American Indian male enrollment at tribal colleges and universities has risen 19 percent in the past six years, according to the American Indian Higher Education Consortium. That translates into 5,807 male students out of a total tribal enrollment of some 18,400, according to AIHEC data.
“In the settings among indigenous people where you have to consider the cultural significance we serve, it is important to help male members,” says Dr. Elmer Guy, president of Navajo Tech. “It’s an important piece,” says Guy, echoing the sentiments of others.
“The men have been displaced,” explains AIHEC chair Dr. Cynthia Lindquist, president of Cankdeska Cikana Community College. She says the traditional role of native men on the reservation as “provider, gatekeeper, hunter” has gone by the wayside as the world around native men on the reservation has evolved.
Designing academic programs that draw on native historical ties to the land, such as the environmental science curriculum Carlston is pursuing, helps address the strong desire of many male students to strike a healthy balance between academic achievement and cultural values.
