Pride of the Reservation

They came in dusty pickup trucks and rattling secondhand cars. Old women in velveteen skirts and turquoise bracelets filed nervously past young men in tight Levi's, sunglasses and cowboy boots. Trim coeds talked with old men in shabby clothes and tall black felt hats. Judged by any criterion--age, dress or deportment--the student body that recently turned up for the opening of the Navaho Community College at Many Farms, Ariz., was as varied as could be found on any campus in the U.S.

Tribal elders were there because they wanted to learn the history of their Navaho ancestors. Others wanted to learn a trade. Many wanted further academic study toward a degree at a four-year college. But all had a particular pride in the first institution of higher education on any Indian reservation in the country.

All they had known were the Bureau of Indian Affairs schools, which they called Washington beolta, the public schools, which they called belagona beolta (white man's schools), or the mission schools, called eeneishoodi beolta (for "those who drag their clothes," meaning the first Catholic priests who came to the reservation). The Navaho likes none of those places. White men's creations, they separate children from their families and tribal traditions, are largely inadequate, and have succeeded mainly in teaching young Indians to feel like second-class citizens. As one result, Indians have the country's highest illiteracy rate. Half of them do not complete high school; 40% are unemployed.

Language and Legends. The community college is something else: dine beolta (the people's school) really belongs to the Navahos themselves. The college is primarily the creation of two men. President Robert Roessel Jr., 42, brought to his dream the experience of 20 years of teaching and school administration among the Navahos, plus the insight of his Navaho wife, Ruth, who is liaison officer for the college. Roessel's indispensable colleague was Raymond Nakai, the Navaho tribal chairman, who has advocated a community college on the reservation for more than a decade.

The two men had a working model: the Rough Rock Demonstration School, an elementary school that was started in 1966 with support from the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the Office of Economic Opportunity, but has an all-Navaho school board with total administrative authority. At Rough Rock, students learn Navaho language and history, along with such standard subjects as English, math and science. Medicine men come to the dormitories in the evening to tell tribal folk tales and legends. The Navaho's focus on family ties is never forgotten, and children are allowed to go home whenever their parents wish.

Time to Learn. Rough Rock was the first such beolta, and it won such enthusiastic support among the Navahos that Roessel and tribal leaders felt encouraged to try the next step. They got a $457,000 grant from OEO to start the community college in a borrowed building. They got $200,000 more from tribal funds, and $60,000 from the William H. Donner Foundation.

The college will accept any Navaho over 18 who applies--even adults who have never spent a day in school. Besides the familiar list of studies, the curriculum includes Navaho language and culture and a variety of vocational and craft courses. Roessel is confident the training will create a labor force that will attract industry to the area, cut the 70% unemployment rate and increase the $680 average yearly family income of reservation Navahos.

Roessel says he will start new courses in any subject requested by students. There will be no pressure to meet a rigid two-year junior college timetable. "We will tell them, 'take your time,' " Roessel says. " 'If you need three years, or four, use them.' " After the college moves from its temporary location to its new campus near Tsaile next year, it will expand its enrollment of 357 to accommodate 1,000 students.

New as it is, N.C.C. is already making an impact far beyond Many Farms. Chippewa Indians from Minnesota have visited the reservation to investigate and are now working to establish a community college of their own. At least eight Pueblo tribes in New Mexico are talking seriously of following the Navaho example.

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