The vision of this doctoral project was to document Native educational leaders who center their school leadership in ancestral knowledge and the cultural practices of their communities as they lead from the middle. Leading from the middle acknowledges a cultural lens to compare that approach to the indigenous. Leading from the middle acknowledges…

An Indigenous research paradigm collectively described by Wilson (2008), Archibald (2008), and Kovach (2009) has yet to be applied to research in undergraduate math education, and specifically at a Tribally Controlled College/University (TCU). Research at TCUs does not require the use of an Indigenous research paradigm, however at the outset, this…

Many working understandings of giftedness exist within dominating Western frameworks, gatekeeping gifted education from students who do not "fit" inside such frameworks (Owens et al., 2018; Rinn et al., 2020; Sternberg et al., 2021). As a result, K-12 Native American, Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian students are underrepresented in…

Purpose and Method of Study: The purpose of this study was to review a Cherokee language immersion school's effort to revitalize the Cherokee language and contribute to the knowledge base of native language immersion school leaders regarding the revival of Native American languages. The research design for this study was a qualitative evaluative…

We are going to run a marathon, together. No matter your fitness level or ability, we will start and finish the race, together. NO ONE GETS LEFT BEHIND. Together, we are preparing, participating in, and completing a marathon, which is 26.2 miles in distance. Our marathon includes many stories from Indigenous people that transcend time, space, and…

I have witnessed Indigenous students experience marginalization, being ignored, being labelled, and earning developmental designations, all as a way to continue systemically oppressing them. Indigenous students traditionally did not sit in rows, they did not compete for the highest mark, an A+ or a B. Indigenous education and learning is a…

Innate to the traditional science curricula taught under the auspices of United States public education are a Neoliberal axiology and Eurocentric epistemology (Howard & Kern, 2019) that do not meet the cultural needs of American Indian students (Cobern & Loving, 2001). It is inequitable that American Indian students do not see themselves…

In the face of colonial efforts to extinguish Indigenous language and culture, Kanien'keha:ka (Mohawk people) have been working to revitalize Kanien'keha (the Mohawk language) since the 1970s. However, Kanien'keha continues to experience greater speaker loss than gain. Through a comprehensive vitality assessment, this dissertation examines the…

The purpose of this mixed-methods study was to increase grit, growth mindset, and self-efficacy in pre-adolescent students attending a K-5 public elementary school in Northwest New Mexico by implementing intervention activities in which students were given opportunities to learn and develop grit and growth mindset, thus resulting in improved…

Native men in higher education experience among the lowest persistence and graduation rates in the United States (Condition of Education, 2020). Native men are subjected to systemic barriers brought by settler colonialism such as racism and patriarchal hegemony which negatively impact their perceptions of masculinity and forces them to move away…

This multiple case study focused on three Native American women superintendents' self-efficacy beliefs and the impact of the Indigenous culture on their decision making as they led their school district through the COVID-19 pandemic. Albert Bandura's self-efficacy theory served as the underpinning theory of this study. The qualitative research…

This qualitative study explored leadership in higher education through the perspectives of six Native American women faculty at a southwest university. The study utilized a Dine informed conceptual framework incorporating the Dine Philosophy of education, the Dine philosophy of life (Sa'ah Naaghai Bik'eh Hozhoon - SNBH), and the Dine ceremonial…

Native American students in higher education are often asked to find a sense of belonging in places and spaces that do not reflect their cultures or worldviews. This can lead to isolation and a feeling of having to choose between themselves and their identities as Indigenous peoples. This contributes to poorer mental health, loss of well-being,…

Indigenous-language immersion (ILI) is a form of schooling where all, or nearly all, classroom instruction in every subject area is conducted in an Indigenous language. This dissertation comprises three case study comparisons of neighboring pairs of ILI and English-medium school programs. The first case study examines two elementary schools in the…

This qualitative self-study written as a memoir located in the Indigenous paradigm -- signals a reference of challenge to a western worldview. As Ary, Jacobs, Sorensen, & Walker, (2014) put it, "A key difference that has been difficult to understand from a Western perspective that values individual knowledge is the indigenous paradigm…