Bill Summary
This legislation, known as the "Native American Language Resource Center Act," aims to create a national resource center for Native American languages. This resource center will support the preservation, protection, and promotion of Native American languages, as well as the fulfillment of the United States' trust responsibility to Native American communities and addressing past discrimination against Native American language speakers. The center will also encourage and support the use of Native American languages in education, provide resources for teacher preparation and technology use, and promote collaboration among formal government, institutional, and community-based Native American language programs. The act also amends the Higher Education Act to authorize the Secretary to provide grants or contracts to eligible entities for the establishment and operation of the resource center, with a focus on benefits for Native Americans living in or closely tied to Native American communities.
Possible Impacts
1) Native American language preservation and revitalization efforts will be supported and prioritized by the government, potentially leading to increased preservation of cultural identities for Native Americans.
2) Native American languages will receive the same recognition and academic credit as other world languages, potentially leading to increased interest and enrollment in Native American language courses in schools.
3) The establishment of a resource center and training center for Native American languages will provide support and resources for language teachers and learners, potentially improving the quality and availability of language education.
[Congressional Bills 116th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 8729 Introduced in House (IH)]
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116th CONGRESS
2d Session
H. R. 8729
To establish a Native American language resource center.
_______________________________________________________________________
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
November 5, 2020
Ms. Haaland (for herself, Ms. Norton, Mr. O'Halleran, Mr. Cardenas, Mr.
Ted Lieu of California, Ms. Lee of California, Ms. Tlaib, Ms. Eshoo,
Mr. Cleaver, Ms. Moore, Mrs. Carolyn B. Maloney of New York, Mr.
Gallego, Mr. Lowenthal, Mr. Case, Mr. Kilmer, Mr. Young, Ms. Garcia of
Texas, Mr. Cook, Mr. Lujan, and Mr. Price of North Carolina) introduced
the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Education
and Labor
_______________________________________________________________________
A BILL
To establish a Native American language resource center.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the
United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the ``Native American Language Resource
Center Act''.
SEC. 2. PURPOSES.
The purposes of this Act are to create a national resource center
to further the policies set forth in the Native American Languages Act
(25 U.S.C. 2901 et seq.) and, through such national resource center,
to--
(1) preserve, protect, and promote the rights and freedom
of Native Americans to use, practice, and develop Native
American languages (as defined in section 103 of the Native
American Languages Act (25 U.S.C. 2902));
(2) allow the United States to fulfill its trust
responsibility to Native American communities and address the
effects of past discrimination against Native American language
speakers;
(3) support revitalization of Native American languages;
(4) encourage and support the use of Native American
languages as a medium of instruction, including use as a medium
of education in schools operated by Tribes, States, the Federal
Government, and Native American language educational
organizations;
(5) encourage and support the use and development of Native
American languages as the medium of instruction for a wide
variety of age levels and academic content areas;
(6) encourage and support elementary schools, secondary
schools, and institutions of higher education to include Native
American languages in the curriculum in the same manner as
other world languages, including through cooperative agreements
and distance education, and to grant proficiency in Native
American languages the same full academic credit as proficiency
in other world languages;
(7) encourage and support the development of appropriate
teacher preparation programming for the teaching of, and
through, Native American languages, including appropriate
alternative pathways to teacher certification;
(8) provide a resource base to provide information to
Federal, Tribal, State, and local governments and Native
American educational organizations to allow the spread of best
practices in the use, practice, and development of Native
American languages in Native American communities, including
use in educational institutions;
(9) provide a resource base for the use of technology in
intensive community-, land-, and archive-based programs, as
well as hybrid and collaborative programs in supporting the
retention, use, development, and teaching of Native American
languages by government and private entities;
(10) provide a developmental base from which interested
Tribal colleges and universities and other Native American
entities might develop fully functioning Native American
language medium education systems that include associated
preschool, elementary school, secondary school, and adult
education programs conducted through the medium of Native
American languages;
(11) provide a means to further collaboration among formal
government, institutional, and community-based Native American
language programs, resources, and research efforts with
additional access to international best practices in indigenous
language revitalization; and
(12) develop a support center system for Native American
language participants to gather and share helpful information
and experiences.
SEC. 3. NATIVE AMERICAN LANGUAGE RESOURCE CENTER.
Section 603 of the Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1123) is
amended--
(1) by redesignating subsections (b) and (c) as subsections
(c) and (d), respectively;
(2) by inserting after subsection (a) the following:
``(b) Native American Language Resource Center Authorized.--
``(1) In general.--The Secretary is authorized to make a
grant to, or enter into a contract with, an eligible entity for
the purpose of--
``(A) establishing, strengthening, and operating a
Native American language resource and training center
as described in paragraph (2); and
``(B) staffing the center with individuals who have
high-level fluency in American Indian, Alaska Native,
and Native Hawaiian languages and are experienced with
Native American language education in the preschool,
elementary school, secondary school, adult education,
and higher education programs.
``(2) Purposes of center.--The Native American language
resource center established under paragraph (1) shall serve as
a resource to--
``(A) improve the capacity to teach and learn
Native American languages and further Native American
language acquisition;
``(B) preserve, protect, and promote the rights and
freedom of Native Americans to use, practice, and
develop Native American languages;
``(C) allow the United States to fulfill its trust
responsibility to Native American communities and
address the effects of past discrimination against
Native American language speakers;
``(D) support revitalization of Native American
languages;
``(E) encourage and support the use of Native
American languages as a medium of instruction,
including use as a medium of education in schools
operated by Tribes, States, the Federal Government, and
Native American language educational organizations;
``(F) encourage and support the use and development
of Native American languages as the medium of
instruction for a wide variety of age levels and
academic content areas;
``(G) encourage and support elementary schools,
secondary schools, and institutions of higher education
to include Native American languages in the curriculum
in the same manner as other world languages, including
through cooperative agreements and distance education,
and to grant proficiency in Native American languages
the same full academic credit as proficiency in other
world languages;
``(H) encourage and support the development of
appropriate teacher preparation programming for the
teaching of, and through, Native American languages,
including appropriate alternative pathways to teacher
certification;
``(I) provide a resource base to provide
information to Federal, Tribal, State, and local
governments and Native American educational
organizations to allow the spread of best practices in
the use, practice, and development of Native American
languages in Native American communities, including use
in educational institutions;
``(J) provide a resource base for the use of
technology in intensive community-, land-, and archive-
based programs, as well as hybrid and collaborative
programs in supporting the retention, use, development,
and teaching of Native American languages by government
and private entities;
``(K) support the acquisition of distance learning
technologies and training for parents, students,
teachers, and learning support staff, including the
compilation and curation of digital libraries and other
online resources in target Native American languages,
the development of distance learning curricula
appropriate for preschool, elementary school, secondary
school, adult education, and postsecondary education,
the pedagogical training for teachers, and other
efforts necessary to continue Native American language
acquisition among American Indian, Alaskan Native, and
Native Hawaiian communities through distance learning;
``(L) provide a developmental base from which
interested Tribal colleges and universities and other
Native American entities might develop fully
functioning Native American language medium education
systems that include associated preschool, elementary
school, secondary school, and adult education programs
conducted through the medium of Native American
languages;
``(M) provide a means to further collaboration
among formal government, institutional, and community-
based Native American language programs, resources, and
research efforts with additional access to
international best practices in indigenous language
revitalization;
``(N) develop a support center system for Native
American language participants to gather and share
helpful information and experiences; and
``(O) address any of the purposes of foreign
language centers included under this section if, in
doing so, the Native American language resource and
training center--
``(i) does so as a subsidiary activity;
``(ii) focuses benefits on Native Americans
living in Native American communities, or
closely tied to such communities; and
``(iii) ensures that one of the outcomes
being strengthened through this subparagraph is
the use of one or more Native American
languages in a Native American community.
``(3) Definitions.--In this subsection:
``(A) Eligible entity.--The term `eligible entity'
means--
``(i) an institution of higher education;
``(ii) a consortium of such institutions;
or
``(iii) a consortium of such institutions
and other entities with unique responsibilities
for Native American languages.
``(B) Native american; native american language.--
The terms `Native American' and `Native American
language' have the meanings given those terms in
section 103 of the Native American Languages Act (25
U.S.C. 2902).''; and
(3) in the matter preceding paragraph (1) of subsection
(c), as redesignated by paragraph (1), by striking ``subsection
(a)'' and inserting ``this section''.
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