Giving Compass' Take:

• Edsource discusses a recent lawsuit involving a small Native American school in Arizona that wants compensation for disability services given the context of poverty and the treatment of the Native population.

• Organizations working in the education sector should pay close attention to this case, as it may have ramifications in other underserved communities. Can NGOs work to fill the equity gap where the government fails?

Here are other ways to expand opportunities for Native American youth through philanthropy.


A lawsuit brought on behalf of schoolchildren in the most remote Native American community in the United States is addressing an emerging question in public education — namely, are school districts required to provide disability services to children who’ve suffered trauma related to poverty and discrimination?

U.S. District Judge Steven P. Logan last week denied a request by the federal government to dismiss most of the case involving children at the Havasupai Elementary School, which is located on the floor of the Grand Canyon in Arizona. The complaint alleges that the Bureau of Indian Education (BIE) and other federal agencies have failed to provide the children with even the most basic education — including health and wellness services.

In his ruling, Logan said the plaintiffs “have adequately alleged that complex trauma and adversity can result in physiological effects constituting a physical impairment.”

“This ruling is a long overdue step toward reckoning with the legacy of oppression that has stained this nation’s consciousness,” said Kathryn Eidmann, a senior attorney for Public Counsel, a Los Angeles-based public interest law firm.

Besides Public Counsel, other firms involved in the case include the Native American Disability Law Center, the Stanford Law School Youth and Education Law Project, and the American Civil Liberties Union of New Mexico.

The case is important, say experts in civil rights and disability law, because of its potential to impact not only on the 183 schools run by the federal Bureau of Indian Education (BIE) — including two in California — but all public schools.

Read the full article on how a small Native American community's lawsuit could affect schools nationwide by David Washburn at edsource.org