College Fund Recruits New Faculty Fellowships Program Officer

January 12, 2015

Matthew Van Alstine Makomenaw, an enrolled member of the Grand Traverse Bay Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians tribes of Michigan, has joined the American Indian College Fund as the Faculty Fellowships Program Officer. He will be responsible for recruiting applicants for faculty fellowship programs and managing all aspects of the fellowship selection process.

Makomenaw comes to the College Fund from Montana State University, where he was an assistant professor of Native American Studies. Prior to his position in Montana, he served as the director of the American Indian Resource Center at the University of Utah. He also served as a graduate assistant with the ASHE/Lumina Fellows Program at Michigan State University, and was the director of Native American Programs at Central Michigan University.

Makomenaw holds a doctorate degree in higher, adult, and lifelong education from Michigan State University, where he completed his dissertation on the success of tribal college students transferring to four-year predominantly white institutions. He holds both a master’s of arts degree in higher, adult, and lifelong education-student affairs and a bachelor of arts in psychology.

He has served as a member of the Indian Advisory Committee for the Utah Museum of Natural History; with the Student Affairs Administrators in Higher Education Student Affairs Administrators in Higher Education (NASPA) with its Region V Indigenous Peoples Knowledge Community; as a member of the board of directors for the Urban Indian Center of Salt Lake City; as a member of the State of Utah’s Governors Native American Summit Committee; and as the Saginaw Chippewa Tribal College Board of Regents secretary.