Founded in 2015, the Dził Ditł’ooí School of Empowerment, Action, and Perseverance (DEAP) is in Navajo, New Mexico. One of the school’s administrators says it was created out of a desire to Indigenize education for students by including traditional Navajo practices and spaces in the curriculum – especially after decades of cultural erasure due to the U.S. Indian boarding school system.

The Indian Health Service is working to provide tens of thousands of children’s books to Indigenous families across the U.S., including parts of the Mountain West.

Elfreida Begay pitched the idea to the school district years ago. After earning her credentials, she teaches the Navajo language to students who elected to take the class.

Elfreida Begay began teaching the Navajo language at Durango High School this fall, helping her Indigenous students reclaim their culture and language after their ancestors were stripped of their Native identities.

The district’s board of education voted 3 to 1 on October 25, 2023, to adopt social studies standards developed by Colorado’s Department of Education in 2022. The meeting was attended by more than 100 people, most of whom were against American Birthright and highly critical of the school board’s president, Tony May.

School board elections happen every other year in Colorado, and they're opportunities for communities to select people who will make important decisions about their local schools. However, in many school district elections, less than a third of eligible voters vote.

Four-day school weeks are becoming more popular nationally as education systems struggle with teacher recruitment and retention. And the Mountain West is keen on truncated scheduling, especially in rural areas.

School districts across the country are grappling with transportation issues due to a shortage of bus drivers. That’s true even in Grand County, Utah, were recruitment efforts are ramping up.

A new report shows preschool enrollment rates dropped significantly during the pandemic. In the Mountain West, the rates of decline varied widely.