The Indigenous Science Initiative is a collaboration between the NACA Inspired Schools Network (NISN) and the Los Alamos National Laboratory Foundation (LANL Foundation) with the goal of creating an open-access (freely accessible and online) science curriculum that centers Indigenous perspective and community values while also featuring inquiry learning, culturally sustaining pedagogies, and climate science through story, the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS), and local context. The current version of the curriculum focuses on an approach to the middle grades – 6th, 7th, and 8th grade – with yearlong plans and four distinct units of instruction per grade level.

Indigenous perspectives have always mattered and Indigenous peoples have practiced science since time immemorial. Western education systems have not historically elevated and centered nor included Indigenous perspectives in science education, let alone in education systems overall. In this day and age, our education systems need to reflect the diversity and beauty of all student backgrounds, including Indigenous students. Through this Initiative, we strive to demonstrate what is possible and a method for centering Indigenous Science and we intend to provide guidance for how to localize this approach across many different contexts. We believe that this work can be a part of a broader effort of “desettling expectations in science education” (Bang et al. 2013), represents a way of responding to the findings of the Martinez-Yazzie Consolidated Case, and contributes to a more equitable public education system for all students.

We envision the Indigenous Science Initiative being beneficial to students and teachers of all backgrounds. This curriculum seeks to center the perspectives and strengths of communities and is written with an eye towards what we call “localization,” or developing and adapting curriculum in partnership with community and according to community values, stories, beliefs, strengths, challenges, opportunities, and much more. In particular, we imagine users of this curriculum adapting and localizing the investigations to best fit their students, local contexts, and histories. We envision users of this curriculum, teachers and students alike, experiencing the curriculum as both a mirror into their life experiences and funds of knowledge as well as a window for developing a curiosity, respect, and understanding of the life experiences and funds of knowledge of others.