Volume XI Fall 1999 Issue #1
On Campus
NWIC building health partnerships
Northwest Indian College (NWIC) has focused upon improving nutrition and increasing physical activity in its efforts to make American Indian people healthier in the Northwest. In partnership with several federal agencies, regional health organizations, and educational institutions, NWIC is developing comprehensive community-based health education, training, and academic programs. Located in Bellingham, Wash., NWIC serves tribes in Washington, Oregon, and Idaho through its distance learning network. After seeing the results of a survey on tribal interests, the Regional Indian Health Board agreed to work with the college to provide for the training needs of those tribes.The Executive Order issued by President Bill Clinton in October 1996 has resulted in significant assistance from federal departments in the Northwest, according to Barbara Roberts, MPH, a Lummi tribal member who chairs the NWIC Division for Health , Humanities, and Social Sciences. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services regional office is collaborating with the college, including providing technical assistance and guest lecturers at the college.
Last June, NWIC and Salish Kootenai College (SKC) co-sponsored a conference on nutrition and physical activity in Spokane along with the American Indian Higher Education Consortium, American Diabetes Association, Portland Area Diabetes Program, and the Indian Health Service. NWIC and SKC are working together to host a U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and tribal college workshop in September on cooperative extension grants and resources. With a Nutrition Challenge Grant from the USDA, the college also is developing a community-based Nutrition Assistant program, which incorporates tribally specific cultural materials in the courses.
Special grants have been received for other community programs, including a Walking Program to increase the physical activity of individuals at risk for diabetes. The W.K. Kellogg Foundation has provided the Lummi Tribe with funds to support the canoe culture as a healthy physical activity. Northwest Indian College provides physical education courses in Indian Canoe Racing, and NWIC and the University of Washington work with the Lummi to provide health-related degrees.
Through its continuing education program, the college provides training to certify fitness instructors and to host annual wellness conferences. One of their annual conferences is designed for preventing alcohol and substance abuse by youth. It is sponsored by local businesses. For more information about these programs, contact Barbara Roberts, division chair of health, at NWIC (360) 676-2772.
Volunteers building log learning centers
In a joint effort between Fond du Lac Tribal & Community College and the Fond du Lac Reservation, a Cultural Learning Center is being constructed on the reservation in Minnesota. The new Cultural Learning Center will be part of the Veteran Memorial Park planned for the site in Cloquet, Minn.At the same time that Fond du Lac has been stacking logs, many other tribal colleges have been doing the same. A total of 23 Cultural Learning Centers will be erected before winter. The centers are a direct response to the 1990 Native American Graves and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA), which provides for the return of sacred ceremonial items to their tribes of origin. These buildings will have the capacity to house, preserve, and display any artifacts returned to the tribes.
The American Indian Higher Education Consortium (AIHEC), in cooperation with the Log Homes Council of the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB), put together a plan to secure a building for each tribal college. Planning for the centers has been funded by a grant from the W. K. Kellogg Foundation, with programmatic and technical assistance from the National Museum of the American Indian, Smithsonian Institution. The buildings also have received material donations from the building industry.
The Fond du Lac Cultural Learning Center building consists of a 48’ by 48’ log structure. The donated logs were cut, prepared, and delivered by Northeastern Log Homes of Kenduskeag, Maine, which also assisted on-site in the construction of the center. In New Mexico, Crownpoint Institute of Technology has constructed an eight-sided hogan around a central fire pit, with a donation of log materials from Air Lock Log Homes of Las Vegas, N.M. In Wisconsin, the College of the Menominee Nation has erected a one-story center complete with carved totems framing the entrance, with a log donation by Town and Country Cedar Homes of Petoskey, Mich.
For more information one how to get involved, contact Anne Edinger at (212) 206-6580.
Turtle Mountain opens dream campus
By Dorreen Yellowbird
When the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Tribe first conceived of a tribal college, it was a simple vision: teach the language, history, and culture to the Turtle Mountain Tribe. That vision is now a reality. It has a building, a site, and the students. It is also proving to be more than that simple dream. Atop one of the highest hills on the reservation in North Dakota perches the brand new college, the modernistic home of the futurists from Turtle Mountain. The college snuggles in an emerald carpet of green and a forest of trees. Spreading wide in its front yard is Lake Belcourt, cool and blue.As people begin entering the new college, they are attracted to pillars that circle the front. On each pillar is a plaque telling the history of the tribe. Just inside the building, columns reach some 30 feet toward the open sky. Light from the windows falls on a large, sacred circle of the four directions and colors. The classroom space, cafeteria, bookstore, and administrative offices would match and exceed those of many colleges or universities. The boards, college staff, and students have more plans, including an auditorium and a path through the woods with stops for tribal history lessons.
“We have come a long way,” Gerald “Carty” Monette, president of the college, said. During the 1930s, ‘40s, and ‘50s, the Turtle Mountain people slipped culturally. Boarding schools and exposure to non-Native culture made it difficult to maintain the language and culture. The tribal college staff can see the changes on the reservation today. Many of those changes have resulted from the tribal college leadership role in promoting and developing the culture and language in the community and the public school system.
On May 22, they opened the doors of the new college. Francis Cree, spiritual leader of the Ojibwa, smoked the traditional pipe to open the next period of the college’s history. The celebration honored college founders, community people, tribal council members, college staff and faculty, the tribal chairman, and state and federal dignitaries who were present. The two councils who conceived of the tribal college were recognized. The Board of Trustees and Board of Directors for the college presented the staff and employees a plaque of special recognition. The administrative council for the tribe chose Monette to be the commencement speaker. They wanted to honor this president who has held the reins of the college for 25 years.
Montana funds non-Indian students
After moving testimony from non-Indian students who attend tribal colleges, the Montana Legislature agreed to provide $1,500 per student to tribal colleges in Montana to help support the cost of educating those students. The U.S. Congress provides annual support to tribal colleges for Indian students only. With the exception of Minnesota, states have largely refused to provide any state funds for tribal colleges until recently. In the past year, New Mexico and Arizona have both agreed to provide some funds to tribal colleges in those states. (See separate story about Arizona in this issue and about New Mexico in Vol. 10, N.4, p.10).In Montana, the momentum seems to be building for a permanent appropriation, according to Dr. Joe McDonald, president of Salish Kootenai College and a long time veteran of the legislative battles. Four years ago, the Montana Legislature appropriated funds to support non-Indian students at tribal colleges for two years. When the appropriation ran out, proponents tried two years ago to get a statute to make the appropriation a permanent part of the budgeting process. The statute succeeded, but the money was never appropriated, leaving the tribal colleges without money for those students for the past two years.
This year the tribal college question became enmeshed in the university system budget, raising questions about whether university funds would be taken from the 13 state schools to give to the tribal colleges and whether the university regents would have authority over tribal college budgets. The tribal college representatives testified that they did not want to take money from the university system. In the end, that amendment was tabled but the appropriation passed. Depending upon the number of non-Indians they each have, the tribal colleges in Montana will receive funds this fall and next year.
McDonald credited the victory primarily to tribal college students and to Rep. Carol Juneau, a Blackfeet tribal member and a former president of Blackfeet Community College. The non-Indian students explained why they needed to attend college close to home and how a college education had changed their lives. They said they had learned from their fellow Indian students as well. “When the students finish, it takes courage to oppose them,” McDonald said. Students not only testify but also visit legislators in their offices. “Some of the people we visited four years ago are our advocates today,” he said.
Arizona provides $17 million for college
The Arizona Legislature has passed an historic law that will return a small portion of taxes collected on the Navajo Nation. The money will assist Diné College with improving its facilities within Arizona. The college will receive $1.5 million for FY 2000 and $1.75 million for the next nine years for a total of $17.25 million. This is the largest appropriation by the state to an Indian tribe for education in history. Diné College is the only tribally controlled college in Arizona.“It was truly a bipartisan effort. I would like to personally acknowledge Speaker of the House Jeff Groscrost; Representatives Tom Gordon, Sylvia Laughter, Deborah Norris; Senators Jack Jackson, Rusty Bowers, and Senate President Brenda Burns; our Vice President for Development, Ferlin Clark; and many others for their generous support,” said Dr. Tommy Lewis, president of Diné College.
The funds will be used for construction of new facilities and improvements for existing Diné College facilities within Arizona. The Diné College Tuba City Center is a first priority. According to Ferlin Clark, the funds will come from the State Transaction Privilege Tax revenues collected from the Navajo Nation. The bill creates a government-to-government and tax sharing partnership between the Navajo Nation and the state of Arizona for the benefit of Navajo students.
Diné College is currently not a part of any community college district, and as a result, it has been ineligible to receive state funding. Dr. Tommy Lewis and Ferlin Clark said they would like to see this Arizona model followed by the states of New Mexico and Utah in the future. “The Navajo Nation supported the college’s effort in seeking Arizona state funding. Now the Navajo Nation needs to maintain its current funding level at a minimum of $2 million in order for the college to secure a stable funding stream while assuring long-term accreditation for the college,” Clark said.
White Earth emphasizes sacred foods
The Woodlands Confederacy of Colleges is building a holistic, culturally responsive, education program that they hope will reduce diabetes and other chronic illnesses. Last April, Dr. Ann Brummel spoke at the St. Paul campus of the University of Minnesota about wild rice and other sacred foods and the concepts behind the curriculum. Brummel is the development coordinator at the White Earth Tribal and Community College in Mahnomen, Minn.In her presentation, Brummel stressed that the tribal college curriculum is centered in the sacred. Culture, environment, history, and family life courses deal with the harvesting of wild rice and the ceremonies in which wild rice has played a traditional role. Wild rice has been important to the Anishinabe people just as the buffalo has been central to the Lakota and the whale to Northwest cultures. Wild rice harvest camps teach young people about responsibility to the extended family. The rice was used along with tobacco in ceremonies as expressions of prayer.
Brummel pointed out that all peoples were at one time tribal peoples, relying on natural, unprocessed foods for healthy living and healing. By stressing respect for sacred foods such as wild rice, the Woodlands Confederacy of Colleges’ nutrition curriculum will be important for the general population as well as for Anishinabe people. During Agriculture Week presentations at the U.S. Capitol, White Earth contributed nearly 100 pounds of wild rice for distribution to visitors at the Woodlands Wisdom exhibit, one of 48 land grant college exhibits on display.
The Woodlands Wisdom Project was conceived by the tribal colleges at a U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) meeting in St. Louis in 1998. The confederacy includes six tribal colleges located in northern states: College of the Menominee Nation, Lac Courte Oreilles Ojibwa Community College, Fond du Lac Tribal and Community College, Leech Lake Tribal College, White Earth, and Turtle Mountain Community College. Congress designated most of these colleges as land grant institutions in 1994. The colleges invited the University of Minnesota, a state land grant institution, to participate. Planning funds for the project were provided by the university’s Visions for Change Program, which is funded by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation. The project is seeking funding from the USDA.
IAIA breaks ground for new home
Thirty-six years is a long time to be homeless, but the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, N..M., will soon have a campus of its own. More than 600 friends and supporters of the school gathered in a tent on a windy Saturday morning in April for the groundbreaking ceremony at the new site.“This day is a day to celebrate,” said IAIA President Della Warrior to the crowd. “This day had been a long time coming…It’s going to mean so much to our students. Our students deserve a quality learning environment.” The new site boasts 140 acres of land donated by Rancho Viejo Limited Partnership in 1990. IAIA has never had its own campus. Since 1981, it has been renting facilities from the College of Santa Fe.
Plans for the $14 million new campus include a 37,000 square foot building for classrooms, a student dormitory, and administrative facilities including a library and dining hall.
IAIA secured $8.5 million for the new campus from Congress, the U.S. Economic Development Administration, and the state legislature. They plan to raise the rest of the money needed from private donors, foundations, and possibly a general obligation bond issue. Congress had earlier decided to discontinue its financial support of the school after fiscal year 1999. Many thought IAIA would have to close its doors (see TCJ, Vol. 10, N.1, pp..48-51).
Many dignitaries spoke, including Sen. Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.), Rep. Tom Udall (D-N.M.), and astronaut John Herrington (Chickasaw). IAIA President Emeritus Lloyd Kiva New (Cherokee) sent a pre-recorded message on videotape for the occasion. The model for the Sacagawea U.S. Dollar Coin, Randy’L Hedow Teton, was an honored guest. She graduated from IAIA.
Following the groundbreaking ceremony, IAIA hosted a pow wow and lunch for those gathered. The guests enjoyed traditional foods, including salmon, wild game, fry bread, stew, and corn . Musician Star Nayea (Sioux), recently signed to V2 Records, sang for the audience. Flute player DeArmond Williams (Caddo/Delaware/Diné) also provided entertainment.
Haskell honors outgoing president
Haskell Indian Nations University asked outgoing Haskell President Dr. Bob Martin and his wife, acclaimed author and poet, Luci Tapahonso, to give the keynote address at the spring commencement last May. Martin’s announcement of his resignation from the university in January prompted the university to select him and Tapahonso in recognition of their contributions to Haskell. Both Martin and Tapahonso have accepted faculty positions at the University of Arizona.Martin is a member of the Oklahoma Cherokee Nation, and Tapahonso is a member of the Dine Nation (Navajo) of New Mexico. Before coming to Haskell, Martin served as president of the Southwestern Indian Polytechnic Institute (SIPI) in Albuquerque, N.M. During his tenure at Haskell the university developed a long-range plan, Vision 2005, designed to meet the challenges of the 21st century. One of the goals was achieved in the fall of 1995, the Elementary Education baccalaureate program. Since then, Haskell has added three new baccalaureate programs-- American Indian Studies, Business Administration, and Environmental Science. Martin cites his time at Haskell as the most important endeavor of his professional career.
Tapahonso, an associate professor of English at the University of Kansas in Lawrence, coordinated cultural events between the university and Haskell. She did readings at Haskell and found Indian keynote speakers. The author of two children’s books and six books of poetry, she has received the 1998 Kansas Governor’s Art Award and “Distinguished Woman” awards from the National Association of Women in Education (1998) and the Girl Scout Council of America (1996). Her poems have also been translated into German, Italian, and French.
Haskell conferred degrees upon 120 graduates, including six graduates earning the Baccalaureate of Science Degree in Elementary Education. This is the third year that baccalaureate degrees have been granted by Haskell. An honorary doctorate degree was awarded to Bill Koch, president and CEO of The Oxbow Group. Haskell, an institutional member of the American Indian Higher Education Consortium (AIHEC), is the only all-Native, inter-tribal university in the United States. Students from over 150 federally recognized tribes and approximately 35 states enroll each year.
Haskell presented a star quilt to Dr. Bob Martin and his wife, Luci Tapahonso. In the background is Miss Haskell, Toni Lee Tsa Toke (Kiowa). Martin is wearing Haskell’s presidential medallion. Photo by Mike Yoder
Circles of Recovery plans 3 year project
By Richard Simonelli
When the White Bison Tribal College Wellbriety Awareness Tour began last March, 200 community members and friends participated in a blessing ceremony at the Longhouse of the Onondaga Nation near Syracuse, N.Y. They sent three Native men on a 11,000 mile trip to involve 31 tribal colleges in the United States and Canada. The men did not travel alone. They carried a hoop of 100 eagle feathers arranged around a willow branch with a large condor feather at the center.At each tribal college, they participated in a Wellbriety Awareness Day where educators, elders, and youth spoke of their own road to recovery and sobriety. The White Bison Hoop carriers explained what activities would take place during the three year Native American Circles of Recovery Program.
Centered at tribal colleges, the recovery program is facilitated by White Bison, Inc, an American Indian non-profit organization. A federal Center for Substance Abuse Treatment grant supports the program. Its purpose is two fold. First, Circles of Recovery will identify “Fire Starters”--local people from the tribal college communities who are in recovery, family members or friends, or others involved in wellness. The Fire Starters will attend training sessions and then form ongoing circles of healing, anchored by their tribal colleges.
The second main focus of Circles of Recovery is on Wellbriety, a new term which refers to a balanced life of sobriety and wellness. There are many bodies of knowledge needed for healing in the Native community, including chemical dependency, process addictions such as codependency, historical trauma such as boarding schools, and traditional, healthy values and activities. Integrated into curriculum, these fields of knowledge will eventually lead to a unique degree in Native American Community Healing. Circles of Recovery plans to identify a tribal college that wants to offer that degree.
Well over 3500 individuals from all but four of the tribal college campuses participated in a Wellbriety Awareness Day and Hoop Ceremony. Kyla Crow at Red Crow College in Cardston, Alberta, Canada, said, “Wellbriety Awareness Day helped me feel proud of who I am. People in the community told me we should have more things like this to give us a better understanding that there is more to life than alcohol. In the last few years our reserve has been losing our members, especially our youth, to alcohol and drugs.”
White Bison is also soliciting stories of recovery and sobriety by Native people for compilation in a Wellbriety Handbook, similar to the Big Book for Alcoholics Anonymous. The first of three Native Americans in Recovery Conferences is scheduled in Colorado Springs, Colo. Sept. 16-19, 1999. For more information about Circles of Recovery activities, contact White Bison at (719) 548-1000, or visit the website at <www.whitebison.org>
IBM librarian hooks up with Bay Mills
Liz Staples, an IBM software engineer, is constructing a virtual library of Internet-based information at Bay Mills Community College (BMCC) in Brimley, Mich. IBM has assigned her to the college for one year. The Virtual Library collects links to information on the Internet relevant to the college and enhances the collection of books, magazines, videotapes, and audiotapes at the BMCC Library/Heritage Center. The prototype website can be visited at <www.bmcc.org/libtest>The college virtual library serves the students and staff of the college and will also be available to individuals with Internet access in their home, school, or at work. Users can research topics related to all of the courses offered by BMCC, especially the language, culture and history of the Native American tribes of Michigan. The Virtual Library will also provide electronically a collection of Head Start publications that were previously not available on the Internet. These publications support the BMCC efforts to bring college degree and certificate programs to Indian Head Start workers nationwide.
“My goal is to provide information without spending a lot of money. I want to make it work for people who don’t have state of the art equipment,” Staples said. Her work is technically challenging for that reason. In addition to having access to the Bay Mills Community College library collection, users will be able to search the online catalogs and periodical lists of local libraries. Access to general Internet search engines and indexes, along with guidelines for using them, will be provided. The site will provide tutorials on subjects such as how to use the Internet for research, evaluate the quality of a web site and cite Internet-based information properly in research papers, along with an “Ask the Librarian” service by e-mail.
Staples comes to Bay Mills Community College through the IBM Faculty Loan Program. The goal of this program is to assist in improving the quality of education by granting qualified employees temporary assignments to teach, counsel, or provide professional support to colleges, universities, and other related educational institutions. These IBM employees are involved with programs that support the needs of minorities, women, disadvantaged students, or students with disabilities. Since 1971, IBM has provided more than 1000 employees, each for a full academic year at no cost, to more than 250 institutions.
Wellness center fights ‘Commod Bods’
With the help of a grant from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, the Fort Peck Community College has created a Community Health and Wellness Center. The elders named the center “Daya Tibi,” which means House of Good Living. The center offers programs to appeal to the entire community, including pregnant women, policemen, heart attack victims, new fathers, adolescents, seniors, and diabetics. An average of 125 people per day use the center for services such as aerobics, weight training, aqua aerobics, nutrition awareness, smoking cessation, and stress management. The staff is starting a snack bar to serve healthy foods, such as blender fruit drinks.The center’s newsletter reports several success stories. A group of men who use the center call themselves the “Commod Bods.” After growing up on USDA commodities, they want to modify their eating habits. They say they are USDA approved. A mother and daughter teamed up and together lost 33 pounds, improving their self-esteem by 100 percent. An elderly stroke victim used the treadmill and weight training and no longer needs his walker.
In collaboration with Montana State University Extension Service, the center staff has developed a seven week nutrition course, which includes presentations by elders on culture and traditional foods preparation, such as dry meat, pemmican, corn soup, juneberry soup, and cherry patties. The center collaborates with more than a dozen other federal, tribal, and state agencies and local businesses.
With the help of Indian Health Service, individuals can get a fitness test and their own exercise plan. After the third fitness test, participants receive a pair of Nike walking shoes to encourage them to keep exercising. Over 51 percent of the students at the college utilize the wellness center. Volunteers who are trained in First Aid and CPR operate the center in the evening. For more information, call Jeanette Charboneau at (406) 768-5630.
White Hat completes Lakota language text
The University of Utah press has published Albert White Hat Sr.’s book, Reading and Writing the Lakota Language. The book represents the work of a lifetime for White Hat, who is an instructor at Sinte Gleska University (SGU) on the Rosebud Reservation in South Dakota. Royalties from the book will go to SGU in memory of White Hat’s mother, Emily Hollow Horn Bear White Hat, and brother, Isadore White Hat, one of SGU’s founding fathers. The book is expected to be used in elementary and high schools and universities throughout the area. Schools in Pine Ridge, S.D., have been using copies of the rough draft while waiting for the text to be published.A heart attack several years ago made White Hat ask himself what legacy he was leaving for future generations, according to an article by Sharon Deets in the Todd County Tribune. “I wanted to leave something for the children and for our people,” he said. For the previous 20 years, White Hat has been teaching from five pages of notes on a yellow pad. Then Jael Kampfe arrived.
A Montana native, Kampfe became acquainted with White Hat’s work through Phil Deloria while she was working on a degree in Religious Studies at Yale. White Hat and Kampfe began the language project in 1992 by taping White Hat’s classes. The transcriptions became the framework for the books, Kampfe said.
Kampfe researched grants, filed reports, and handled administrative background details. “It freed Albert to focus on what was really important. His strength is oral, mine is trying to figure out how to use Western education as a tool for all his wisdom. What makes what Albert has done so remarkable is the synthesis of a traditional approach with the Western approach to language learning,” Kampfe told the Todd County Tribune.
In his foreword for the book, noted author Vine Deloria Jr. writes, “Albert White Hat reverses the traditional method of explaining language by showing through examples, anecdotes, and lessons the world view and values of the Brule Lakota, how people speak and think. (He) has created a grammar that takes the reader inside the community slang and puns so we can enjoy (the) kind of linguistic play that is so characteristic of our people.”
OLC meets Kresge challenge for new center
Oglala Lakota College (OLC) has met its goal of raising over $1.3 million in order to obtain a $650,000 Kresge Foundation challenge grant, according to OLC President Thomas Shortbull. Ground was broken March 1 for the new Rapid City College Center, and it was expected to be completed by early fall. The 12,000 square foot instructional center is next to the Mother Butler Center. It will contain 11 classrooms, 3 offices, a small library area, and a student lounge.To construct the Rapid City College Center, OLC received a $300,000 grant from the Bush Foundation, $50,000 from the Arthur Vining Davis Foundation, and raised over $200,000 in the Rapid City community. A grant from the National Science Foundation will assist in furnishing the new college center with state of the art computers and distance learning capabilities.
OLC is two years ahead of schedule on its 10-year capital campaign to build a new college center at each of OLC’s 10 instructional sites and a new library. Shortbull believes the growing enrollment can be attributed to the new college centers.