‘More Than a Demographic’: The Important Work of Cultivating Native Teachers

For nearly two decades, the Sapsik’ʷałá teacher education program has worked with Oregon’s nine federally recognized tribes to create a career pathway to address the tremendous gap in Native teacher representation in the classroom. Tyler Sumpter and Stephanie Wright graduated from the program in 2021 and began their first year of teaching. As they navigate the challenges of early-career educators, they also must think about what kind of teachers they want to be and what it means to reflect their Native American students’ identities in the classroom.