"Over the weekend I talked with some teachers from one of the local reservation schools. "Why do some of students who come from the reservation schools and attend UND do poorly?" I asked them. I've always heard there were poor teachers in those reservation schools who really don't care. Parents don't insist that the children do homework and they don't make them accountable for slipshod work and poor performance. Instead they make excuses for their child. Most teachers work really hard to get their students through school, but some of the really good teachers work so hard that after a few years they are burned out and leave, the teachers countered.

And no, all the problems on the reservations and in the schools cannot be blamed on the world we live in and racism. Bill Cosby is right: We need to take responsibility for our children's education and our lives, while remembering that this is a world that can be unfair."

Get the Story:
DORREEN YELLOW BIRD COLUMN: Cosby speaks uncomfortable, and incomplete, truth (The Grand Forks Herald 5/25)

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