Composition: History & Theory: 1960 - 1969
Rough Rock Demonstration School
Description
In The American School From the Puritans to No Child Left Behind (2008), Joel Spring explains that the Rough Rock Demonstration School, established in 1966 on a Navajo reservation, had the main goal of allowing Navajo parents “to control the education of their children and participate in all aspects of their schooling” during this time period (428). This school placed an emphasis on learning both the Navajo language and English so that children could “fend successfully in both cultures and see the Navajo way as part of a universal system of values” (428). Historically, American Indians were dispersed through the general population with no regard for culture. This “forced assimilation,” according to Sring, was because of “a desire to divest the Indian of his land” (429).
Date of Upload
3/14/09