Presidential DocumentExecutive Order 135922011-31624
Improving American Indian and Alaska Native Educational Opportunities and Strengthening Tribal Colleges and Universities
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Published
December 8, 2011
Signed
December 2, 2011
Issuing agencies
Executive Office of the President
Full Text
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<title>Federal Register, Volume 76 Issue 236 (Thursday, December 8, 2011)</title>
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[Federal Register Volume 76, Number 236 (Thursday, December 8, 2011)]
[Presidential Documents]
[Pages 76603-76607]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [<a href="http://www.gpo.gov">www.gpo.gov</a>]
[FR Doc No: 2011-31624]
Presidential Documents
Federal Register / Vol. 76, No. 236 / Thursday, December 8, 2011 /
Presidential Documents
[[Page 76603]]
Executive Order 13592 of December 2, 2011
Improving American Indian and Alaska Native
Educational Opportunities and Strengthening Tribal
Colleges and Universities
By the authority vested in me as President by the
Constitution and the laws of the United States of
America, I hereby order as follows:
Section 1. Policy. The United States has a unique
political and legal relationship with the federally
recognized American Indian and Alaska Native (AI/AN)
tribes across the country, as set forth in the
Constitution of the United States, treaties, Executive
Orders, and court decisions. For centuries, the Federal
Government's relationship with these tribes has been
guided by a trust responsibility--a long-standing
commitment on the part of our Government to protect the
unique rights and ensure the well-being of our Nation's
tribes, while respecting their tribal sovereignty. In
recognition of that special commitment--and in
fulfillment of the solemn obligations it entails--
Federal agencies must help improve educational
opportunities provided to all AI/AN students, including
students attending public schools in cities and in
rural areas, students attending schools operated and
funded by the Department of the Interior's Bureau of
Indian Education (BIE), and students attending
postsecondary institutions, including Tribal Colleges
and Universities (TCUs). This is an urgent need. Recent
studies show that AI/AN students are dropping out of
school at an alarming rate, that our Nation has made
little or no progress in closing the achievement gap
between AI/AN students and their non-AI/AN student
counterparts, and that many Native languages are on the
verge of extinction.
It is the policy of my Administration to support
activities that will strengthen the Nation by expanding
educational opportunities and improving educational
outcomes for all AI/AN students in order to fulfill our
commitment to furthering tribal self-determination and
to help ensure that AI/AN students have an opportunity
to learn their Native languages and histories and
receive complete and competitive educations that
prepare them for college, careers, and productive and
satisfying lives.
My Administration is also committed to improving
educational opportunities for students attending TCUs.
TCUs maintain, preserve, and restore Native languages
and cultural traditions; offer a high-quality college
education; provide career and technical education, job
training, and other career-building programs; and often
serve as anchors in some of the country's poorest and
most remote areas.
Sec. 2. Definitions. (a) ``Agency'' means any executive
department or agency designated by the Secretary of
Education and the Secretary of the Interior to
participate in this order.
(b) ``Indian tribe'' means an Indian or Alaska
Native tribe, band, nation, pueblo, village, or
community that the Secretary of the Interior
acknowledges to exist as an Indian tribe pursuant to
the Federally Recognized Indian Tribe List Act of 1994,
25 U.S.C. 479a.
(c) ``American Indian and Alaska Native'' means a
member of an Indian tribe, as membership is defined by
the tribe.
(d) ``Public school'' means a Head Start center or
a pre-kindergarten, elementary, or secondary school
that is predominantly funded by public means through
the Federal Government, a State, a local educational
agency,
[[Page 76604]]
or an Indian tribal government, including a school
operated directly by or through contract or grant with
the BIE, an Indian tribe, or a State, county, or local
government.
(e) ``Tribal Colleges and Universities'' are those
institutions that are chartered by their respective
Indian tribes through the sovereign authority of the
tribes or by the Federal Government, and defined in
section 316 of the Higher Education Act of 1965 (20
U.S.C. 1059c).
Sec. 3. White House Initiative on American Indian and
Alaska Native Education.
(a) Establishment. There is hereby established the
White House Initiative on American Indian and Alaska
Native Education (Initiative). The Secretary of
Education and the Secretary of the Interior will co-
chair the Initiative. The Secretary of Education shall
appoint an Executive Director who shall be responsible
for overseeing implementation of the Initiative. This
individual shall be a senior-level, Department of
Education official who shall serve as the Secretary of
Education's senior policy advisor on Federal policies
affecting AI/AN education.
The Executive Director shall work closely with the BIE
Director and shall provide periodic reports to the
Secretaries of Education and the Interior regarding
progress achieved under the Initiative. The Executive
Director shall coordinate frequent consultations with
tribal officials and shall provide staff support for
the National Advisory Council on Indian Education
(NACIE), authorized by section 7141 of the Elementary
and Secondary Education Act of 1965 (ESEA) (20 U.S.C.
7471).
(b) Mission and Functions. (1) The Initiative shall
help expand educational opportunities and improve
educational outcomes for all AI/AN students, including
opportunities to learn their Native languages,
cultures, and histories and receive complete and
competitive educations that prepare them for college,
careers, and productive and satisfying lives, by:
(i) working closely with the Executive Office of
the President to help ensure AI/AN participation in the
development and implementation of key Administration
priorities;
(ii) strengthening the relationship between the
Department of Education, which has substantial
expertise and resources to help improve Indian
education, and the Department of the Interior and its
BIE, which directly operates or provides grants to
tribes to operate an extensive primary, secondary, and
college level school system for AI/AN children and
young adults;
(iii) coordinating, in consultation with the
Department of Education's Director of Indian Education,
programs administered by the Department of Education
and other executive branch agencies regarding AI/AN
education;
(iv) serving as a liaison with other executive
branch agencies on AI/AN issues and advising those
agencies on how they might help to promote AI/AN
educational opportunities;
(v) reporting on the development, implementation,
and coordination of education policy and programs that
affect AI/AN students;
(vi) furthering tribal sovereignty by supporting
efforts, consistent with applicable law, to build the
capacity of tribal educational agencies and TCUs to
provide high-quality education services to AI/AN
children;
(vii) developing in partnership with tribal
educational agencies a more routine and streamlined
process for entering into agreements for educational
studies conducted on tribal lands;
(viii) developing sufficient data resources to
inform progress on Federal performance indicators, in
close collaboration with the Department of Education's
National Center for Educational Statistics;
(ix) encouraging and coordinating Federal
partnerships with public, private, philanthropic, and
nonprofit entities to help increase the readiness of
AI/AN students for school, college, and careers, and to
help increase the number and percentage of AI/AN
students completing college; and
[[Page 76605]]
(x) developing a national network of individuals,
organizations, and communities to share best practices
in AI/AN education and encouraging them to implement
these practices.
(2) In order to help expand educational opportunities and improve education
outcomes for AI/AN students, the Initiative shall promote, encourage, and
undertake efforts, consistent with applicable law, to meet the following
objectives:
(i) increasing the number and percentage of AI/AN
children who enter kindergarten ready for success
through improved access to high-quality early learning
programs and services, including Native language
immersion programs, that encourage the learning and
development of AI/AN children from birth through age
five;
(ii) supporting the expanded implementation of
education reform strategies that have shown evidence of
success in enabling AI/AN students to acquire a
rigorous and well-rounded education and increasing
their access to the support services that prepare them
for college, careers, and civic involvement;
(iii) increasing the number and percentage of AI/AN
students who have access to excellent teachers and
school leaders, including effective science,
technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM),
language, and special education teachers, in part by
supporting efforts to improve the recruitment,
development, and retention of effective AI/AN teachers
and other effective teachers and school leaders,
particularly through TCUs;
(iv) reducing the AI/AN student dropout rate and
helping a greater number and percentage of those
students who stay in high school to be ready for
college and careers by the time of their graduation and
college completion, in part by promoting a positive
school climate and supporting successful and innovative
dropout-prevention and recovery strategies that better
engage AI/AN youths in their learning and help them
catch up academically;
(v) providing pathways that enable those who have
dropped out to reenter educational or training programs
and acquire degrees, certificates, or industry-
recognized credentials and obtain quality jobs, and
expanding access to high-quality education programs
leading to career advancement, especially in the STEM
fields, by supporting adult, career, and technical
education;
(vi) increasing college access and completion for
AI/AN students through strategies to strengthen the
capacity of postsecondary institutions, particularly
TCUs; and
(vii) helping to ensure that the unique cultural,
educational, and language needs of AI/AN students are
met.
(3) To facilitate a new partnership between the Department of Education and
the Department of the Interior, to improve AI/AN education, the Executive
Director shall work with the BIE Director and develop a Memorandum of
Understanding (MOU) between the two Departments that will take advantage of
both Departments' expertise, resources, and facilities. The MOU shall be
completed within 120 days of the date of this order. Among other things,
the MOU shall address how the Departments will collaborate in carrying out
the policy set out in section 1 of this order.
(c) Funding and Administrative Support. Subject to
the availability of appropriations, the Department of
Education shall fund the Initiative, including NACIE.
The Department shall also provide administrative
support for the Initiative to the extent permitted by
law and within existing appropriations.
(d) Interagency Working Group. There is established
the Interagency Working Group on AI/AN education and
TCUs, which shall be convened by the Initiative's
Executive Director. The Working Group shall consist of
senior officials from the Department of Education and
the Department of the Interior and officials from the
Departments of Justice, Agriculture, Labor, Health and
Human Services, and Energy, the Environmental
Protection Agency, and the White House Domestic Policy
Council, as well as such additional agencies and
offices as the Secretaries of Education and the
Interior may
[[Page 76606]]
designate. Senior officials shall be designated by the
heads of their respective agencies and offices. The
Secretaries of Education and the Interior shall serve
as the co-chairs of the Interagency Working Group.
(e) Federal Agency Plans. (1) Each agency
designated by the co-chairs as a member of the
Interagency Working Group shall develop and implement a
two-part, 4-year plan of the agency's efforts to
fulfill the purposes of this order, with part one of
the plan focusing on all AI/AN students except for
those attending TCUs, and part two focusing on AI/AN
students attending TCUs. Each agency plan shall
include:
(i) annual performance indicators and appropriate
measurable objectives with which the agency will
measure its success in meeting the goals of this order;
(ii) information on how the agency intends to
increase the capacity of educational agencies and
institutions, including our Nation's public schools and
TCUs, to deliver high-quality education and related
social services to all AI/AN students; and
(iii) agency efforts to enhance the ability of
these educational agencies and institutions serving AI/
AN students to compete effectively for grants,
contracts, cooperative agreements, and other Federal
resources with which to serve the education needs of
AI/AN students, and to encourage eligible schools and
colleges serving those students to apply for Federal
grants and participate in Federal education programs,
as appropriate. Agency plans may also emphasize access
to high-quality educational opportunities for AI/AN
students, consistent with requirements of the ESEA, the
Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, and other
applicable Federal education statutes; the preservation
and revitalization of tribal languages and cultural
traditions; and innovative approaches to more
seamlessly align early learning, elementary, and
secondary education programs with the work of TCUs.
(2) Submission. Each agency shall submit its plan to the Initiative by a
deadline established by the co-chairs. In consultation with NACIE, the
Initiative shall then review agency plans and develop, for submission to
the President, a synthesized interagency plan to achieve the aims of this
order.
(3) Annual Performance Reports. Each agency shall submit to the Initiative
an Annual Performance Report that measures the agency's performance against
the objectives set forth in its plan. In consultation with NACIE, the
Initiative shall review and combine Annual Performance Reports from the
various agencies into one annual report, which shall be submitted to the
Secretaries of Education and the Interior for review.
(f) Private Sector. In consultation with NACIE, and
consistent with applicable law, the Interagency Working
Group, led by the Executive Director, shall encourage
the private sector to assist State- and locally-
operated public schools that serve large numbers of AI/
AN students, including those attending our Nation's
public schools, publicly-funded preschools, and TCUs,
through increased use of such strategies as:
(1) Providing funds to support the preservation and revitalization of
Native languages and cultures;
(2) Providing funds to support increased institutional endowments;
(3) Helping these schools develop expertise in financial and facilities
management, information systems, and curricula; and
(4) Providing resources for the hiring and training of effective teachers
and administrators.
Sec. 4. Study. In carrying out this order, the
Secretaries of Education and the Interior shall study
and collect information on the education of AI/AN
students.
Sec. 5. General Provisions. (a) NACIE shall serve as
the Initiative's advisory committee.
[[Page 76607]]
(b) Insofar as the Federal Advisory Committee Act,
as amended (5 U.S.C. App.), may apply to the
Initiative, any functions of the President under that
Act, except for those of reporting to the Congress,
shall be performed by the Secretary of Education, in
consultation with the Secretary of the Interior, in
accordance with the guidelines issued by the
Administrator of General Services.
(c) This order revokes Executive Order 13270 of
July 3, 2002, Executive Order 13336 of April 30, 2004,
and section 1(n) of Executive Order 13585 of September
30, 2011.
(d) The heads of agencies shall assist and provide
such information to the Initiative as may be necessary
to carry out its functions, consistent with applicable
law.
(e) Nothing in this order shall be construed to
impair or otherwise affect:
(1) authority granted by law to an executive department, agency, or the
head thereof; or
(2) functions of the Director of the Office of Management and Budget
relating to budgetary, administrative, or legislative proposals.
(f) This order is not intended to, and does not,
create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural,
enforceable at law or in equity by any party against
the United States, its departments, agencies, or
entities, its officers, employees, or agents, or any
other person.
<GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT>
(Presidential Sig.)
THE WHITE HOUSE,
December 2, 2011.
[FR Doc. 2011-31624
Filed 12-7-11; 8:45 am]
Billing code 3295-F2-P
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</html>Indexed from Federal Register on December 8, 2011.
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