Holbrook Indian School
A Seventh-day Adventist Boarding Academy Serving Native American Youth Since 1946
Holbrook Indian School
Connects Students with Their Creator By Diana Fish
H
olbrook Indian School (HIS) changes lives! On the reservation, Native Americans live in a nation within a nation. There is a constant dissonance between the identities and value systems of the two nations. In the Native American world: • studies report that one in three women has been raped or has suffered sexual abuse. (Most cases go unreported.) • almost half the population never graduates from high school. • only eight out of 100 have college degrees.
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• more than 50 percent live at or below the poverty line. • 40 percent of those who die by suicide are between the ages of 15 and 24. • young adults, ages 18 to 24, have higher rates of suicide than the general population. It is no wonder that children and youth come to HIS with unimaginable challenges. Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), substance abuse, and trust and abandonment issues seem to be the norm. At home, some students don’t have electricity or running water. Learning and
functioning in an academic setting with these kinds of challenges presents a unique challenge of its own. Through the NEW (Nutrition, Exercise, Wellness) You Health Initiative, HIS seeks to minister to the whole person by teaching students how to improve every dimension of their lives through four pillars called MAPS. This acronym stands for mental health, academic achievement, physical health, and spiritual growth—each a fundamental component of a student’s environment and education with specific, practical applications.