Challenges in Serving Indigenous/Ethnic Minority Peoples

While Tribal Colleges and Universities (TCUs) and Ethnic Minority-Serving Institutions (EMSIs) enjoy some facilitating factors, these factors can also bring challenges from different perspectives, such as the funding sources for TCUs and preferential policies for EMSIs. TCUs and EMSIs face some similar internal challenges like student readiness and preparation and the lack of qualified faculty members; however, the reasons and contexts of these challenges often differ. For TCUs, many internal challenges derive from the poverty and social issues on tribal reservations. For EMSIs, their internal challenges come from the general situation of the Chinese higher education system and their relatively marginalized position within this system.