Closing the Engagement Gap: Integrating Culture-Based Arts Learning to Boost Indigenous Students’ School Success and All Students’ Place-Specific Cultural Knowledge

• In Event: Roundtable Session 18
  In Roundtable Session: Negotiating Culture and Power in Arts Education

Abstract

Contentious discussion of the achievement gap in American schools has largely ignored its underlying source: the engagement gap, defined as the difference between what students do and what they are capable of doing. This paper argues that gap can be bridged in schools that serve Indigenous students when educators recognize the positive relationship between culture-based arts education and student engagement and motivation. We describe an innovative research project that harnesses the synergies between arts education and student engagement and 30 white school teachers’ practice after working with local Indigenous mentors to close the achievement gap between Native and non-Native students. The resultant model for transformative teaching integrates culture-based content, place-specific Indigenous arts knowledge, and project-based learning across the core curriculum.

Authors

• James W. Bequette, University of Minnesota

• Jean E. Ness, University of Minnesota