Volume XI Spring 2000 Issue #3
On Campus
Little Priest immerses students in language
“Just as it was with our relatives long ago, we must continue to keep our language alive so we can pass it on to future generations,” Isaac Caramony intoned in fluent and lyric HoChunk (Winnebago). His student audience sat in rapt attention as he spoke of the importance of the HoChunk language immersion class he was helping to teach. The students had just undergone three weeks of complex drills in a subject most were novices in, yet they were eager for more. Little Priest Tribal College (LPTC)’s language and culture program sponsored the three-week, summer, language immersion class.
“Attendance at LPTC HoChunk classes is increasing due to the successes of past and current students. When one student demonstrates increased HoChunk language proficiency, that inspires others to do the same,” Language Program Coordinator Elaine Rice said. Last November, the students began a six month series of classes, one weekend a month at the college in Winnebago, Neb. Since the class focuses on using HoChunk in the home, adult students attend for six hours on Saturday and bring their children to the three-hour Sunday session. The classes are given in HoChunk with no other language spoken, allowing students to hear and become comfortable with the sound of the language. No notes or other written materials are allowed during class time, requiring students to learn through practice and memory. After each weekend session, however, families take pre-printed notes and pre-recorded audio tapes home to sharpen their HoChunk skills.
Zena Reeves, LPTC HoChunk instructor, and Rice decided to introduce the language immersion concept to local students while it is still feasible. Rice said, “Figuratively speaking, the language waters are still ten feet deep so we can immerse ourselves in the resources we have. In a few years, if we do nothing, our fluency--our resources-- may be too shallow to allow us to have these classes.”
Is language important to sustain a culture and the identity of a tribe? Many others in the Winnebago community believe so. Lorelei DeCora, director of the Winnebago Diabetes Project, told the class that the sessions are part of a holistic approach to improving the physical and mental health of the people. “The language connects us to every other aspect of our life as tribal members,” she said. “But you also have to think about learning with reverence. That’s the essence of what our HoChunk language is about.”
Keweenaw college accepted in AIHEC
The Keweenaw Bay Ojibwa Community College (KBOCC) was accepted as the 33rd member of the American Indian Higher Education Consortium (AIHEC) at the October meeting in Oklahoma City, Okla. Representing the college were Debra J. Parrish, president, and Carlota Beauprey, board of regents chairperson, as well as Keweenaw Bay Tribal Council members Amy St. Arnold and Terri Denomie.
Chartered on July 12, 1975, by the Keweenaw Bay Tribal Council, the college is located on the L’Anse Indian Reservation in Baraga, Mich. The first graduate was honored on May 19, 1979. The college has an articulation agreement with Suomi College in Hancock, Mich., and three transfer credit agreements with universities in Michigan (Michigan Technological University, Northern Michigan University, and Lake Superior State University). An interactive telecommunications system transmits courses through the distance learning classroom.
Currently, 71 students are enrolled in college degree programs and continuing education courses. Programs offered are liberal studies, social sciences (associate of arts), accounting, computer information systems, and office technician (associate of applied science). Ojibwa studies courses include Ojibwa language, culture, beadwork, basketry, history, and literature.
Lilly to support construction at colleges
Lilly Endowment Inc., has made a grant of $30 million to the American Indian College Fund to support construction of educational facilities at tribal colleges and universities. The award is the largest gift ever received by the 10-year-old college fund. The grant is also the single, largest private gift ever made to an Indian organization in the United States, according to Richard Williams, executive director of the college fund.
The $30 million award will support construction of safe, up-to-date classrooms, laboratories, and libraries at tribal colleges. Typically, the colleges are housed in makeshift facilities such as trailers and converted buildings. “A gift of this magnitude gives all American Indian people hope,” said Williams. “Tribal colleges are reversing a century of failure by giving Indian students a holistic academic and cultural education. With this vote of confidence in tribal America, Lilly Endowment will create a legacy for learning at tribal colleges.” The Lilly gift helped the college fund launch the “Campaign of Hope”—a five-year capital campaign to raise at least $120 million to address the overwhelming physical needs on tribal college campuses. The college fund campaign will supplement the money the colleges are raising in their own capital campaigns. Although Congress promised money for facilities renovation in the federal legislation governing tribal colleges, it has never provided any funds for that purpose.
“From our discussions with the college fund, it was clear to us that the physical conditions of the tribal colleges represented a crucial need,” said N. Clay Robbins, president of the Lilly Endowment. The following examples illustrate the needs:
- Diné College, Arizona–Crumbling buildings show cracks, tiles fall from ceilings, elevators often fail, library is more than half-empty.
- Little Big Horn College, Montana–Main classroom building converted from abandoned gym.
- United Tribes Technical College, North Dakota. –Housed in an old Army fort built in 1903.
- Dull Knife Memorial College, Montana–Primary heating provided by an old, unstable, coal-burning furnace.
The Lilly Endowment gift follows two other recent capital donations to the college fund. In June, the David and Lucile Packard Foundation made a $2 million grant for construction of math and science buildings. In July, the Tierney Family Foundation announced a gift of $1 million for childcare facilities at the tribal colleges.
Newspaper honors two influential presidents
A state newspaper in Montana has named two tribal college presidents to its list of the 100 Most Influential Montanans of the 20th Century. In its October 24 edition, the Missoulian honored Dr. Janine Pease-Pretty on Top and Dr. Joe McDonald. McDonald, 66, has been president of Salish Kootenai College for 22 years. Before becoming president, he had been a teacher, coach, and administrator at elementary, high school, and college levels. For eight years, he was a Confederated Salish and Kootenai tribal councilman. He has received awards from the Carnegie Foundation, the Montana governor, and the National Indian Education Association. The Missoulian quoted him speaking about the divisions in the state, “I think if we could open up our minds and try to respect one another, the racial divisions would solve themselves.”
Pease-Pretty on Top was the first woman of Crow lineage to earn a doctorate degree. She has served as the president of Little Big Horn College for 18 years. She earned her doctorate in education in 1993 and received a “genius” award form the MacArthur Foundation in 1994. “Arts, music, and the lore of the Crow Nation are at the heart of our program, and about 25 percent of our classes are in the Crow language,” she told the Missoulian. “We try to match the school to the community—like a spider on a mirror.”
The list also included five other American Indians—Chief Plenty Coups (Crow chief), Bonnie Heavy Runner Craig (Blackfeet educator), Norman Hollow (Assiniboine-Sioux chairman), James Welch (Blackfeet-Gros Ventre author), and Susan Walking Bear Yellowtail (Crow nurse). For details, see the web site, www.missoulian.com
Joe McDonald: “Education can help heal the divisions that
continue to confront us.” Photo by Lee Marmon
Janine Pease-Pretty on Top with her granddaughter, Tillie Elizabeth Jordan Stewart:
“Family is all important to us.” Photo by Felicity Kurth
Diné receives Upward Bound, Microsoft grants
TSAILE, Ariz. — Students here at Diné College will be the beneficiaries of a four-year TRIO/Upward Bound grant awarded by the U.S. Department of Education for $800,000. The Upward Bound program is designed to meet the educational needs of low income and minority (especially Native American) high school students who lack educational opportunities. “We are excited to be hosting the Upward Bound program at Diné College once again, and we’re excited that Diné College can be included in preparing regional high school students for college,” said Dr. Francis Becenti, Diné College vice president for academic affairs.
Schools on the Navajo Nation that are partners in the Upward Bound grant include: Chinle, Ft. Wingate, Ganado, Many Farms, Monument Valley, Navajo Pine, Pinon, Red Mesa, Rough Rock, Rock Point, St. Michaels, Sanders Valley, and Window Rock. Mark Retasket, director of student services and recruitment, said the Upward Bound grant’s summer enrichment program will utilize Diné College’s Visualization Laboratory for Mathematics and Science and its Learning Center Laboratory for Tutorial Work. For more information about the TRIO/Upward Bound Program call 520/724-6730 or 724-6723.
In other news, Microsoft Corporation has donated over $177,000 of Microsoft software and books and another $25,000 for hardware and training use. Diné College was chosen as the fourth tribal college to collaborate with other higher education consortia to obtain this community outreach grant. The College Computer Services Department planned to upgrade all college PCs to the new Microsoft Windows 98, second edition, and Office 2000 Professional, second addition, if requested. Stanley Eldridge, director of Diné College Computer Services, said, “We hope to place NT servers at each community campus so that local Internet publishing is easy and readily available. The BackOffice System Management Server will allow Computer Services to maintain and manage the servers and client PCs from the Tsaile campus if desired,” he continued.
Microsoft informed the college that this grant is renewable based on a review and survey of how well the institution has used the products during the preceding year. This relationship should allow Diné College to always have the latest office products available for its users, labs, and libraries.
Information tech degrees offered in Montana
The U.S. Department of Education has funded the “Learning Across The Miles” project through the Learning Anytime Anywhere Partnership (LAAP). Learning Across The Miles is a project of the Montana Consortium designed to allow residents of geographically remote areas in the state the opportunity to earn a bachelor of science degree in information technology. The Montana Consortium partners include Rocky Mountain College and three tribal colleges--Fort Peck Community College in the far northeast corner of the state, Little Big Horn College in southeast Montana, and Salish Kootenai College in northwestern Montana. Rocky Mountain College is a small, private, liberal arts college in Billings, Mont. The three-year grant of $540,000 was awarded through the department’s Fund for the Improvement of Post-secondary Education (FIPSE).
The Learning Across The Miles program is unique because it creates a virtual cohort of students from each of the participating colleges. Students will learn via a combination of on-site instruction, ITV, and Internet-based courses. The program of study is designed and taught by faculty of all participating colleges, making this project a true collaborative effort. The first cohort of students began in January 2000.
For more information about the Montana Consortium or this program, call 406/657-1099, check out the web site at www.mtconsortium.org or see TCJ, Vol. X, N.3, pp. 14-18.
Entrepreneurship scholarships announced
The Theodore R. & Vivian M. Johnson Scholarship Foundation has awarded 20 Tribal College Entrepreneurship Scholarship grants for the 1999-2000 school year, the fifth year that such grants have been awarded. This year’s grants total $434,800. The awards are administered by the colleges and awarded to their students who are studying entrepreneurship with plans to develop or expand a business on or near the reservation.
The tribal colleges receiving awards this year include Blackfeet Community College, Si Tanka College (formerly Cheyenne River Community College), Dull Knife Memorial College, Fond du Lac Tribal & Community College, Fort Belknap College, Fort Berthold Community College, Fort Peck Community College, Lac Courte Oreilles Ojibwa Community College, Leech Lake Tribal College, Little Big Horn College, College of the Menominee Nation, Northwest Indian College, Oglala Lakota College, Salish Kootenai College, Sinte Gleska University, Sisseton-Wahpeton Community College, Sitting Bull College, Stone Child College, Turtle Mountain Community College, and United Tribes Technical College.
With this year’s award, the foundation will have committed more than $1.5 million to scholarships for tribal college students in entrepreneurship. The number of new businesses reported, while small, is growing. Scholarship support for American Indians was a goal of Theodore R. Johnson, Sr., and his wife, Vivian Chesley Macleod Johnson, when they established trust funds that would eventually provide the asset base of the foundation. In 1999-2000, the foundation plans expenditures of over $600,000 for programs related to tribal college entrepreneurship education.
CIT telecommunications grant to link Navajos
Early on September 30, U.S. Rep. Tom Udall (D-N.M.) telephoned Crownpoint Institute of Technology (CIT) President James Tutt with news of a $600,000 telecommunications grant to the school. The grant was awarded through the U. S. Commerce Department’s Telecommunications Facilities Program.
The remote tribal college in Crownpoint, N.M., is linked by microwave tower and satellite with Northern Arizona University’s NAUNET telecommunications hub site at Ft. Defiance, Ariz. CIT expects to begin offering educational teleservice outreach to as many as 50 eastern Navajo and Shiprock agency chapters this spring.
Michael Dodson and Susannah Cisco surf the net at Crownpoint while an unknown visitor tries her hand as Queen of the Net. Photos by Gail Burke.
“The significance of this system for the Navajo Nation is limitless,” said Development Officer Jay R. DeGroat. “Our students can earn credit for telecourses from NAU and many other colleges and universities that share the system, and we’ll make our courses available to them. We’ll be beaming into high schools, too, so students there can earn college credit before they enroll at college. People who didn’t finish high school can finish their GED at home. In fact, with this system in place, a lot of people who previously couldn’t access higher education may be earning their degrees on their own time and in their own living rooms.” DeGroat has been working the past year with NAU Vice Provost for State Programs Edward G. Groenhout to lay the groundwork for the telecommunications system.
“This system strengthens the school’s ability to help a population that’s been educationally under served for so long. In addition to educational services, this new access will result in leadership development, networking, and long-term strategic planning that includes all the Navajo people. We’re making technology work to support our culture as well as our economy,” Tutt said.
Just two weeks earlier, on September 17, the institute celebrated Internet Day with a community feast prepared for 200 visitors by culinary arts students. CIT is planning to make Internet services available to residents of Crownpoint and neighboring communities. Visitors e-mailed friends and relatives and researched information during the celebration. The CIT staff received two weeks of intensive training in Internet use when school opened last fall. “What this means for the Navajo people is empowerment,” said Bruce McDowell, the consultant who installed the system and provided the training. “Those who choose to remain on the reservation now can do so and still earn a good living. Internet also helps CIT prepare others for good jobs in the outside world,” he said.
North Dakota colleges expanding distance ed
BISMARCK, ND – The North Dakota Association of Tribal Colleges received a grant from the U. S. Department of Education to expand distance education programs in the state. All of the six tribal colleges involved in the association now offer primarily two-year, associate degrees. (Two have recently begun offering bachelor’s degrees in conjunction with other institutions.) With the grant, the association itself eventually will become a baccalaureate degree granting institution.
Initially, the association will focus upon sharing courses, making extensive use of the faculty, technology, and curricula of the six tribal colleges. The colleges currently share courses through interactive video, but the grant will provide for CD-ROM and Internet-based course work. Over a three-year period, the association will receive $779,600 to carry out its activities. The association was one of 29 grantees funded in the nation out of 600 applications to FIPSE (the Fund for the Improvement of Post-secondary Education) Learning Anytime Anywhere Partnership Program. The five North Dakota tribal colleges in the association will establish partnerships with Sisseton Wahpeton Community College of Sisseton, S.D.; Western Cooperative for Educational Telecommunications (WICHE) of Boulder, Colo.; Archipelago Productions of Monterey, Calif.; and, Legacy Solutions of Bismarck, N.D.
Phyllis Howard, executive director of the North Dakota Association of Tribal Colleges, said the grant will help fulfill a long-standing goal of the six colleges. They approved a model for developing the four-year institution in 1991. She said, “It’s exciting to be on the edge of technology, particularly when we can provide higher education to our remote Indian reservations. I’m particularly pleased because these college courses can reach elders, senior citizens, TANF clients, and other individuals who cannot go to college every day.” (TANF is the federal Temporary Assistance for Needy Family program.)
WICHE will contribute its expertise in distance learning delivery, online students service delivery, and accreditation of distance learning programs. Legacy Solutions, a private sector general computing firm, will help develop an online student data system and help produce the CD-ROMs for the project. Archipelago Productions, a national publishing group, will provide access to their CD course work and assist in annotating these courses with specific cultural material.
Tribal college trades ideas with Appalachia
By Judy Jones, special to the Tribal College Journal
CUMBERLAND, Ky. – Sinte Gleska University has teamed up with an Appalachian community college to show students in both places the importance of retaining their cultures. Last fall, Sinte Gleska, in Mission, S.D., began offering a Native American history course with selections from Appalachian literature. “I saw a lot of parallels between the situation here and the situation in Appalachia,” said Todd Williams, instructor of literature at Sinte. “The land use and exploitation issues, the ownership issues, the economic issues – I could go on and on.”
At Southeast Community College in Cumberland, Ky., students are studying modern social problems in Appalachia, supplemented with Native American history. Students exchange e-mail and web sites so they can learn the problems of each community from those who live and work there.
The idea for the courses arose during a meeting of the Rural Community College Initiative, a 10-year project sponsored by the Ford Foundation to study ways to improve the economy of rural, low-income communities by improving access to higher education. Sinte Gleska and Southeast are two of 24 participants in the initiative.
“In spite of the harsh conditions in these distressed communities, we have found rich and vibrant cultures,” said Roy Silver, Southeast sociology professor. Themes at each college have a striking similarity. Deprived of land by outside exploiters, the native population is left with depleted natural resources and diminished indigenous leadership.
“We felt that to a great extent our Indian people had not participated in modern society because they never felt empowered,” said Dr. James Shanley, president of Fort Peck Community College in Poplar, Mont. “They never felt that anybody wanted them to participate, nor did they have any serious decision making or choices about how they were going to participate.”
“In Appalachia there was an idea that we weren’t supposed to be leaders,” Ayers said at a presentation to the American Association of Community Colleges. “This attitude had to be combated and, to a certain extent, must still be combated today.”
Turtle Mountain providing health training
Turtle Mountain Community College is collaborating with the University of North Dakota to provide interdisciplinary training for students in occupational therapy, physical therapy, social work, medical technology, and medicine. Project CRISTAL (Collaborative Rural Interdisciplinary Service Training and Learning) is designed to improve health care services to populations residing in a rural reservation area of North Dakota.
The construction crew included Robin Guido; Valorie Johnson of the W.K. Kellogg Foundation; IAIA president Della Warrior; Air Lock Log Homes President Susan Oster; Leticia Chambers of the IAIA board; Joanna Big Feather of the IAIA Museum; and AIHEC Project Coordinator Anne Edinger.
Photo by Antonio Ruales
The Turtle Mountain Chippewa Reservation was selected as the site for Project CRISTAL because it provides an excellent training ground for students and faculty due to the numerous, varied health conditions that may not be found elsewhere. The interdisciplinary training model fits the traditional cultural belief of holistic medicine and community health. Through Project CRISTAL, students and faculty will gain an understanding of each health discipline and how each approaches health problems. The training will focus upon patient-centered and community-oriented learning.
The project is intended to help recruit and retain health care practitioners to work on reservations in North Dakota and to make rural practice an attractive choice for health professionals. Project CRISTAL will link rural and under-served communities with health resources using computer-aided instruction, electronic mail networking, V-Tel connectivity, and electronic library resources. The project will provide valuable insight into health issues of American Indian populations, which may lead to future research specific to the Turtle Mountain Community. For more information on Project CRISTAL, contact Ella Bruce, Project CRISTAL coordinator, at 701/477-7839.
NASA supports Si Tanka science degrees
In coordination with South Dakota School of Mines and Technology, Si Tanka College faculty is developing degrees in environmental science and computer science over the next 3½ years, with special emphasis in the areas of GIS/GPS/Remote Sensing. The new degrees result from a curriculum development grant from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) to the tribal college’s Science and Natural Resources and Technology Departments. The environmental science degree will have three programs of emphasis for students to follow, according to T.L. Traversie, president of Si Tanka College (formerly Cheyenne River Community College). At first, the degree will include hydrology, followed by tracks in soil science and atmospheric science.
These degree tracks will emphasize the importance of the land, water, and air to the future reservation communities. Cultural integrity and contemporary technology are also important to the new degrees, according to T.M. “Bull” Bennett, chairman of the department. Si Tanka College already had a memorandum of understanding and a curriculum development agreement with the school of mines, which is being expanded. The grant will also allow the college to build a lab area for use with its GIS (Geographic Information Systems) and GPS (Global Positioning Satellite) equipment, as well as its other research technology.
Northwest hires Native art instructor
Ramon Murillo has joined the staff of Northwest Indian College (NWIC) as the first full-time Native American art instructor on the main campus at Lummi, Wash. An experienced teacher, Murillo has taught traditional and fine arts to native students in Idaho, Alaska, Nevada, New Mexico, and Alberta, Canada. He made the move to NWIC from the Fort Hall Reservation in Idaho, where he is an enrolled member of the Shoshone-Bannock tribe. A life-long artist, Murillo is passionate about art, saying his art has been most influenced by the Creator and nature. He believes his “excitement combined with believing” leads to good work. His creations have won several awards and appeared in various publications.
In the future, Murillo would like to offer a non-toxic printmaking class. Murillo became interested in non-toxic techniques when his own health suffered from chemicals used with traditional techniques. He is the first person to receive a post-graduate degree from the Canadian School of Non-Toxic Printmaking. He also holds a Master of Fine Arts in Printmaking from the University of Oregon. To avoid toxins, he etches images into film instead of copper and uses vegetable oil in place of paint thinner for clean up. The expense is similar to standard printmaking techniques, and there are positive benefits for both the artist and the environment, he said.
Students cruise the information superhighway
By Jake Kapsner
Staying busy is no problem for Rich Murto. As the person responsible for maintaining the computer resources of the secondary schools, business operations, and community library of the Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa, Murto is a key player in an initiative aimed at boosting the number of American Indians who pursue careers in computer science.
The initiative, administered by Fond du Lac Tribal & Community College in Cloquet, Minn., is funded by a $1.38 million grant from the National Science Foundation. It has brought a modern computer infrastructure to the reservation community. When Murto started working for the Fond du Lac Education Division, the Ojibwe School's technology infrastructure was limited to12 ancient PCs. By 1994, the first year of the NSF grant, Murto had increased that number to 65. Today, the Fond du Lac Ojibwe School boasts a modern computer infrastructure with 135 computers -- not a bad ratio for a school with 200 students, he said. They've also installed new PCs in every elementary and high school classroom.
The NSF funding helped Fond du Lac link its tribal center, elementary school, and high school to the college using a wide area network of underground fiber-optic lines. It pays for Internet service. The tribe also wants to connect the casino and health clinic to the wide area network and to supply them with Internet access.
"The project has really springboarded the local school system and community into the Internet era," said FDLTCC President Lester Jack Briggs. The NSF-funded initiative exposes children to the potential of computers, capturing their interest before they become intimidated by the technology. "We start 'em young here," Murto said. Kids are introduced to computers in the Head Start preschool program, and the K-12 curriculum incorporates computer activities in every facet of a child's education.
In addition to maintaining this new technology and planning for further expansion, Murto spends his summers helping young people learn the tools of the trade. He has taught at one of four summer camps sponsored by FDLTCC as part of the NSF-funded initiatives. High school students under his tutelage created Web pages with photographs that show the summer program in action. (See http://www.ojibwe.pvt.k12.mn.us/summer98/index.htm.)
Children learn to enjoy computers at summer camps. Pictured are fourth graders Rebecca and Leanne with their instructor, Marlys Plucinak. Photo by Jonathan Chapman
IAIA builds cultural center despite cuts
“It was like an old fashioned barn-raising,” said Della Warrior, president of the Institute of American Indian Arts (IAIA) in Santa Fe. About 200 volunteers showed up last October to construct the first building for the institute’s new campus using mostly donated materials. In less than one day, they erected the 4,400 square foot Cultural Learning Center. Warrior (Otoe-Missouria) and IAIA Trustee Tom Thompson (Blackfeet) watched a golden eagle circle the site as the structure was erected.
Warrior appreciated the good omen and the enthusiastic support for the beleaguered art college. For more than two years, Warrior has been leading a campaign to fight decreases in federal funding through the same kind of grass-roots activism that stacked the logs for the eight-sided, hogan-shaped center. While work proceeded on the cultural center, the U.S. Congress was cutting the institute’s federal funding by half, down to $2.125 million for this year. Congress created the IAIA in 1986 as a federally chartered college, but language in the fiscal year 2000 appropriation bill said that this would be the last year of federal funding.
According to a statement from the IAIA Board of Trustees, the institute has raised enough public and private funds to continue constructing the new campus. Construction of the new campus is essential to reduce the extraordinary rent paid for the last two decades in Santa Fe since IAIA had no home of its own (see TCJ, Vol. X, N.1). The college will need to raise a total of $15.4 million for the construction.
IAIA’s cultural center is one of 30 being constructed on tribal college campuses nationwide. Initiated by a grant from the W. K. Kellogg Foundation of Battle Creek, Mich., the centers are sponsored by the American Indian Higher Education Consortium (AIHEC). They represent a unique partnership between private industry, a foundation, and the tribal colleges. The Log Homes Council of the National Association of Home Builders donated log structures to each college community. The centers will serve as repositories for tribal material culture, create venues for contemporary exhibitions by students and local artists, and provide public space for performance and speaking engagements.
Air-Lock Log Homes of Las Vegas, N.M., provided the logs to IAIA and three other tribal colleges (Southwestern Indian Polytechnic Institute and Crownpoint Institute of Technology in New Mexico and Fort Peck Community College in Montana). The IAIA cultural center also received donated materials and services from Commercial Roofing, Boddington Lumber, Flintco, Inc., Mesa Steel, Inc., Carrier Air Corporation, Santa Fe Concrete, Sandia Plumbing and Heating, Signgraphics, Navajo Construction, and several foundations.