Announcements
FY26 Postdoctoral Fellows Welcome!
Native Curriculum Partnership
As a result of Research and Public Service Project (RPSP) funding from the state of New Mexico, the Center of Regional Studies, the Department of Native American Studies, and the Institute for American Indian Education came together to form the University of New Mexico’s Native Curriculum Partnership (NCP). NCP collaborated with local tribal leaders, Native educators, and community consultants to initiate the process of creating Indigenous film and curriculum materials for K-12 students in New Mexico. Two films will be released in 2025. Their trailers can be viewed below.
Trailer: Roxanne’s World
Written and directed by CRS's Aracely "Arcie" Chapa.
The Art and Activism film, Roxanne’s World, will highlight the artistic and community work of Roxanne Swentzell. This documentary offers a view of Swentzell’s journey as a ceramic artist and community seedkeeper. Through her community-based projects on permaculture, Swentzell demonstrates the ways Native communities can strengthen their relationships with family, community, culture, and land.
Trailer: Indigenous Education
Written and directed by CRS's Aracely "Arcie" Chapa.
The Indigenous Educaiton film focuses on the impact of the Yazzie/Martinez consolidated case ruling and demonstrates strengths in tribal education and language revitalization practices. The film will include stories from American Indian educators and their experiences teaching and learning in the Southwest.
A Center for Regional Studies Film
Trailer: Acequias: The Legacy Lives On
Written and directed by CRS's Aracely "Arcie" Chapa.
This beautiful film unfolds through a series of storylines including the acequias' current challenges, such as climate change and water rights transfers, their important role in the development of local food sheds, and the economic opportunity they provide for members of rural communities.
Book Release by
University of New Mexico Press
The story of Wilhelmina Yazzie and her son’s effort to seek an adequate education in New Mexico schools revealed an educational system with poor policy implementation, inadequate funding, and piecemeal educational reform. The 2018 decision in the Yazzie/Martinez lawsuit proved what has always been known: the educational needs of Native American students were not being met.
In this superb collection of essays, the contributors cover the background and significance of the lawsuit and its impact on racial and social politics; provide an overview of the Native American educational system; present a policy analysis of the New Mexico Indian Education Act; study comparable cases in Utah and Arizona; discuss the financial cost to recoup a sustainable education system for students; review testimonials from the experiences of expert witnesses; and consider the institutional implications from higher education, K-12 schools, tribal education departments, and students.
The Yazzie Case provides essential reading for educators, policy analysts, attorneys, professors, and students to understand the historically entrenched racism and colonial barriers impacting all Native American students in New Mexico’s public schools. It constructs a new vision and calls for transformational change to resolve the systemic challenges plaguing Native American students in New Mexico’s public education system.
