The Advising and Career Services Book and Film Club is pleased to share the seventh in a series of emails to help the advising and career services communities further understand the experience of Indigenous students, settler-colonialism, and Indigenization efforts in higher education.

In this episode, we continue to explore resources for the advisor and career services community related to working with Indigenous students in higher education. As always, we encourage you to explore these resources and reflect on the experiences of Indigenous students at UW-Madison. Continue to ask yourself how we can transform our advising practice and create spaces of belonging for Indigenous students.

Our heartfelt thanks to the creators of these materials and their willingness to share them with us, the wider UW Community, and beyond.

Episode 7: Connecting the Dots: Putting Learning into Practice – Part II

Report: Higher Education Equity Initiatives for Native Americans

Click image for full report

The American Indian College Fund is uniquely qualified to launch an Indigenous Higher Education Equity Initiative. Founded in 1989, the College Fund has served as the nation’s largest charity supporting Native higher education for 30 years. The College Fund believes “Education is the answer” to the social and economic issues facing Native American communities and our country as a whole. To that end, the College Fund provided nearly 6,000 scholarships last year totaling $7.65 million to American Indian students, with more than 131,000 scholarships and tribal college program support totaling $201 million since its inception. The College Fund also supports a variety of academic and support programs at the nation’s 35 accredited tribal colleges and universities, which are located on or near Indian reservations, ensuring students have the tools to graduate and succeed in their careers. The College Fund consistently receives top ratings from independent charity evaluators and is one of the nation’s top 100 charities named to the Better Business Bureau’s Wise Giving Alliance. For more information about the American Indian College Fund, please visit www.collegefund.org.

Further reading on this topic…

100 Ways: Indigenizing & Decolonizing Academic Programs

In Our Own Best Interest: Tribal Colleges in America

Click map to learn more about Tribal Colleges and Universities in the United States

While we are serving students in a large flagship university, we might also consider approaches and strategies that Tribal Colleges and Universities use to serve indigenous students in a culturally relevant way. What can we learn from TCUs about different ways to serve students? How do their approaches differ from other institutions?

Recording of the Our Shared Future session from the 2021 UW Advising Conference: Listening to Land FIG

Our History: Memories of the Tribal College Movement

It’s Your Turn!

Consider how you might incorporate the information and learning you’ve gained through this series into your practice. You may want to journal about this or discuss with a colleague or companion.
Identify 1-2 action steps that you will take. Write them down.
Share your action steps with a colleague or companion and ask them to check in with you in a week or so to check on your progress or to discuss strategies.

More than an Acknowledgement: Putting First Peoples First in the Academy

Dr. Paul Whitinui, Associate Professor, University of Victoria, British Columbia, Canada

Thursday, April 29, 2021 | 12:00 – 1:00 (CST) | REGISTER HERE

Courses of Interest (share with your students)

AIS 450:008

Sovereignty and the Schoolhouse: American Indian Education Histories, 1492 to the Present

AIS 450:077

Beginning Dakota Language I

What thoughts and feelings came up for you when engaging this material?
How does what you learned relate to your role in advising and/or career services?
What ideas or next steps might you discuss with colleagues within your unit to put your learning in action?