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Tribal Colleges – Providing Native People with Access to Choice, Visibility and Control

This article was first published on the website of the American Indian College Fund, a grantee partner of Johnson Scholarship Foundation. It is one of many organizations that facilitate educational opportunities for Indigenous people, a focus area of the Foundation. JSF also has worked directly with tribal colleges and universities across the country to expand educational opportunities for Indigenous students. The article was shared with permission.

Fall is back-to-school time for college students all over Indian Country. It is a time when I pause and think about how important tribal colleges and universities (TCUs) are and how critical it is for mainstream institutions to have support readily available for Native students.

In June, I shared thoughts about the meaning of tribal sovereignty as symbolized by our tribal flags and by the flags of tribal colleges. Now as the fall semester has started across schools nationwide, I have been thinking about how TCUs represent sovereignty and enact sovereign rights.

From their very existence and through the ways they serve students and communities, TCUs are models of tribal sovereignty. Sovereignty is a legal term that emerged to frame the rights and responsibilities of Tribal Nations. I think of sovereignty as reflecting our inherent rights as people—our right to speak our languages, inhabit and have access to our homelands, and to retain our Indigenous ways of living. Because the missions of TCUs are grounded in providing access to traditional knowledge, practices, and values, their programs strengthen sovereignty.

We can also think of sovereignty in terms of self-determination, providing Native people with access to choices, visibility, and control over our own decisions and resources. Tribally chartered institutions, like most TCUs, are established under the authority of tribes to establish their own education systems as acts of self-determination.

American Indian College Fund student ambassadors and scholars. © 2022.

Both students who attend TCUs and the communities these students serve benefit in both symbolic and practical ways from their institutions’ commitment to sovereignty and self-determination. Nearly all TCUs are place-based and are located on or near tribal homelands. Our very locations reclaim lands. The education TCUs provide is restorative, helping Native students to overcome the troubling, often harmful educational effects of boarding schools. Our commitment to revitalizing cultures and languages, fostering extended family relationships, and building economies means Tribal Nations can be healthier and more prosperous. I have always appreciated that one of the most valuable characteristics of TCUs is the community they serve—comprised of the people and the land as a primary source of knowledge.

A few years ago, the College Fund, in collaboration with the Gallup Purdue Index and with funding from the Lumina Foundation, surveyed TCU alumni. Those of us who work with TCUs were not surprised that the survey revealed TCU graduates were two times more likely than their peers to thrive when it came to elements of well-being, such as feeling motivated, enjoying their work (purpose), feeling supported and loved (social), having financial security (financial), having a sense of belonging and relationships (community), and enjoying good health (physical). These survey results affirm that TCUs matter in ways that are critical to self-determination and sovereignty.

Students attending mainstream, often predominately white institutions must also have the attention and support that TCU students receive. They are entitled to this support so they can also receive an education that helps them be healthier and more prosperous.

Students are supported through representation and visibility. When students see themselves reflected in the curriculum and in the faculty, staff, and public actions of their institutions they thrive.

The purpose of education for tribal people is both well-being and self-actualization and supporting the ability to govern ourselves, which is affirmed by many scholars and educators. This occurs more naturally at TCUs because of their programs and locations. Attaining this goal of education at a mainstream institution requires a more conscious effort—not just from the faculty and staff at the institution—but also from the students who attend them.

Native people have a right to go to school wherever they wish, and while the College Fund is deeply committed to TCUs and to the continued establishment of tribal higher education institutions, we recognize that access to an education for Native students must be more broadly supported. When we support Native students in achieving their educational dreams at all higher education institutions, we strengthen Tribal sovereignty.

As the fall semester brings many good things to Native students everywhere, please join me and the College Fund by supporting Native students and advocating for their inclusion and success. Visit the College Fund’s website, www.collegefund.org, to learn more about Native students, tribal colleges, and our work at the American Indian College Fund.


Cheryl Crazy Bull is CEO and President of the American Indian College Fund.

Creating Visibility and Supportive Campus Environments for Native American Students

The American Indian College Fund explored how to support higher education’s role in creating safe and welcoming environments and greater visibility for American Indian and Alaska Native (AIAN) students at a convening it hosted of students, tribal college leaders and leaders from mainstream institutions of higher education (IHE), policy organizations and funders.

What we heard affirmed what we already knew — for Native students to be successful in college the institution must be committed to their inclusion.

Native students shared they want to go to college in an environment where their unique tribal identities are recognized, where their history and current lives are included in the curriculum and in campus life, and where they are visible.

Supporting education equity for Native students takes many forms. Native students at tribal colleges and mainstream institutions have benefited from Johnson Scholarship Foundation’s support of access to higher education through scholarships. The American Indian College Fund works to expand student support to specific ways that higher education institutions can be proactive with inclusion.

Four specific approaches were identified that can have an immediate impact on the experiences of Native students with higher education:

  1. Land acknowledgment: All higher education institutions exist on land that once served as the homeland of one or more tribal nations. Westward expansion, war and removal all impacted the abilities of tribes to situate themselves or have claims on homelands. When land acknowledgment occurs, Native students’ existence and experience is validated. I’ve learned that it is also a good educational exercise because most people don’t know whose homelands they are living on.

2. Representation in curriculum, at events and functions and in public materials: The history and contemporary experiences of indigenous peoples are usually not represented in curriculum. In addition, many times Native peoples are not onstage or giving presentations and are rarely included in public-facing places like websites and brochures. IHE can examine and modify curriculum to insure inclusion. For example, any American government class that doesn’t include tribal governments as a form of governance in the U.S. should immediately remedy that. When events are organized and representatives of various populations are invited to participate, inclusion of Native speakers should be automatically considered and materials and media should be reviewed to determine if Native student photos and stories are included.

3. Data inclusion: Ensuring the institution’s leadership knows the status of Native students is critical to success, whether it is one student or 400. Often the numbers are used as an excuse for not knowing the status of Native students and for not reporting that status to the public and to enrolled students. This may require extra effort to define who will be included in that population and what reporting will look like, but it is essential to overcoming invisibility.

4. Facilitating pathways through expanded recruitment, scholarship support and student services: IHE should examine their recruitment footprint and ensure enough outreach to have a broad group of potential students. They should also ensure sufficient financial support and targeted student services are provided, including designated advisors and counselors. Students also shared that having their own space matters. Native student centers and residential housing creates visible support on campus.

It takes intentional effort and sufficient investment to create climates where Native students can succeed. Native students are themselves excellent informants about what works. Tribal colleges and universities are good resources for best practices and strategic partnerships to support success.


Cheryl Crazy Bull is a member of the Sicangu Lakota Tribe and is President and CEO of the American Indian College Fund. She has more than 30 years of experience in Native higher education.

Social Justice Through Education

This week we re-post an article by Cheryl Crazy Bull, President of the American Indian College Fund. The American Indian College Fund is an important grantee partner of the Foundation and we had a chance to see Cheryl (and a lot of other good friends) earlier this month in San Diego at the Annual Conference of Native American’s in Philanthropy.

The Foundation’s mission is “to assist disadvantaged people to obtain education and employment.” A big part of our grant making – over $19 million to date – is directed to indigenous peoples, mainly for education.

Cheryl Crazy Bull’s article resonates with the Foundation’s mission. The status quo is iniquitous and it is untenable. Indigenous Peoples in the United States and Canada (or anywhere else) should not have to endure subpar social and economic conditions. Education is the means by which Indigenous Peoples can achieve a decent standard of living and scholarships are indeed an instrument of social justice.

We also share Cheryl’s admiration of tribal colleges. The Foundation has been providing scholarship support to students of tribal colleges for over 20 years and they form an important part of our investment in education. Our scholarships are not restricted to the best and the brightest. They are available to anyone with a passing average. Like the tribal colleges, we believe that education must be available to anyone who needs and desires it.

We have noticed positive change over the past 25 years. Tribal economies have improved as have education rates. There is still much to be done. We commend Cheryl’s article to you and implore our fellow education funders to include grants for scholarships to Indigenous Peoples in the portfolios.

Social Justice Through Education a Shared Sentiment for Empowering Nations

By: Cheryl Crazy Bull, President of the American Indian College Fund

I was inspired to see Hilary Pennington’s article, “Rethinking scholarships as social justice” in the Ford Foundation’s Equals Change blog. Her article examines the approach in action through the implementation of the Ford Foundation’s International Fellowships Program, which spans 22 countries and a decade to support emerging leaders who face discrimination because of their gender, race, ethnicity, religion, economic status, or physical ability. Her essay opens the door to discussing and examining further why scholarships are particularly important to indigenous people as tools of social justice and opportunity.

Here at the American Indian College Fund scholarships are the underpinning for social justice in American Indian and Alaska Native (AIAN) communities. Scholarships support students in their path to better lives for themselves, their families, and their tribes.

Pennington speaks to the importance of educating leaders in marginalized communities to further social justice in some of the world’s poorest countries. Countries in Africa, Asia, and the Middle East were routinely plundered for raw earth minerals, timber, rubber, and oil. The history of colonization undisputedly left a swath of poverty and dis-empowered individuals in its wake with regard to political contributions, education, and control over the nation’s resources. The College Fund shares The Ford Foundation’s mission of social justice through scholarships and empowering citizens from nations that were weakened through colonization, however, we focus within the borders of the United States. Like peoples of other colonized nations, AIAN people were and still are sovereign nations, and in many cases their experiences parallel those of peoples living in countries in Asia, Africa, and South America as external nations imposed political systems that excluded and oppressed original inhabitants to wrest control of valuable land and resources.

American Indian and Alaska Native nations in the United States remain sovereign nations. They have a special relationship with the federal government based on treaties. Tribes share the experiences of other former colonized nations. The struggle continues today because the political and social inequality rooted in colonization has led to deeply entrenched poverty among indigenous peoples. The many other issues in the news: health care inequalities, substance abuse, lower high school and college graduation rates, and the like, are all merely side effects of endemic poverty (The U.S. Census Bureau reported its 2014 one-year estimates at 28.3% of AIAN people are living below the poverty line, compared with 15.5% of the overall population). Rather than treating the many symptoms related to poverty, the American Indian College Fund believes that education is the answer to empowering individuals and creating thriving Native communities.

Pennington referencing significant recent scholarship gifts to prominent institutions says it remains to be seen whether scholarships reach non-traditional candidates to “actually challenge entrenched systems of inequality,” stating that too many scholarships reach students who are already at the top. At the American Indian College Fund, we know that in addition to the best and the brightest students in AIAN communities there are many deserving students who have aspirations for a higher education. These students, too, can and should be encouraged to make important contributions. In Native communities where poverty is endemic, it is AIAN students who are often left with few options for a higher education.

While scholarships provide access to institutions of higher education, their symbolic value cannot be taken for granted. Scholarship support, coupled with the student services developed for AIAN students by tribal colleges, signals to our students that they are seen, that they are heard, and that we stand with them. We agree that non-traditional students are necessary for any movement to dismantle systems of oppression. Thirty-nine percent of the students the American Indian College Fund supported in 2014-15 with scholarships were first-generation students, and of those 49% had dependents and 38% were single parents. In addition, the students we support are non-traditional in that they are older, with an average age of 29.

Current and future leaders of social justice movements for racial and gender equity have and will continue to have tribal college degrees.

Tribal colleges and universities were created during the Civil Rights movement by tribal nations for just that purpose. Tribal leaders saw the need to educate the next generation to prevent “brain drain” and to lead their communities in business, health care, law, education, and science. These leaders knew that access to an affordable, quality higher education while preserving their cultures was the key to their endurance and success. Today the American Indian College Fund provides monetary support for 35 tribal colleges and universities serving AIAN communities nationwide and also provides students with scholarship support to attend them. It is interesting to note that tribal colleges and universities led the way with grass-roots, tailored education programming that reached deep into the community, serving the needs of many community members other than just students, in the same model that the United States Agency for International Development has found to be most successful today. Led and staffed by dedicated local community members, tribal colleges have also established culturally based early childhood education programs, health clinics, libraries, adult education courses, and more, which has expanded the sustainability of Native communities, their cultures, and their traditions.

Like the Ford Foundation, we find that scholarship recipients develop the skills needed to make a positive global impact and find solutions to increasingly complex world challenges, such as environmental degradation and sustainable business development. Indigenous communities are often ground zero for observing the effects of global climate change, and Native scientists educated at tribal colleges and participating in NASA and College Fund research programs are studying first-hand the impacts on water and soil quality, impacting not just the community and region, but the entire nation.

We are passionate in our belief that a higher education will ensure that the inequities of colonization can be remedied and that our current and future generations in Native communities succeed. Tribal colleges educate teachers who serve as role models in schools in Native communities, where today the majority of teachers are still non-Native. They educate health care providers who integrate traditional and western practices of medicine for effective healing practices for their communities. They educate community leaders like Kevin Killer, a member of the Lakota nation who grew up in Denver but went back to his community to attend and graduate from Oglala Lakota College. Today he serves his community as a South Dakota state legislator. Killer recognizes the importance of education in creating economically sustainable communities, saying, “Oglala Lakota College and tribal colleges in general help provide educational opportunities to members living on reservations. Without these opportunities there would be an even steeper hill to climb towards social justice. Having an institution of higher learning in so many communities around the nation is a privilege that many younger tribal members have only recently gained access to in the last 40 years. Tribal colleges serve as the impetus to many opportunities, including my own story of running for elected office. That would have been difficult at a larger institution.”

Killer is particularly interested in representing young people, as he serves a reservation with many challenges and a high birth rate (in Shannon County, half of the population was under the age of 18 in 2013) and he wants to ensure his constituents receive the representation, health care, and education they need and deserve. This past session Killer sponsored successful bills to create a paraprofessional tuition assistance scholarship program, a Native American achievement schools grant program, and instruction on South Dakota’s tribal history, culture, and government.

We at the College Fund believe that scholarships are the ultimate tool in social justice, helping to heal the wounds caused by poverty and injustice by giving students who otherwise could not afford an education opportunity and hope for a better future. The process is slow and inequality persists today—still only slightly more than 13% American Indians aged 25 and older have a college degree according to the U.S. Census—less than half of their non-Native peers (28.3%) counterparts. But like the Ford Foundation, the College Fund is committed to social justice by creating opportunities for all, and creating awareness about the transformative power an education has on entire communities and the need to support educational opportunities for all.

Global injustices exist within our own borders.  At the American Indian College Fund we stand with Native students to support scholarships and programs that help them get a higher education. We invite you to join us as we help our students to excel and go on to rebuild prosperous Native communities for today and for future generations.

To see the original post, visit: http://www.collegefund.org/blog/?p=2330