Southwestern Indian Polytechnic Institute’s (SIPI) Restorative Teachings team gathered for our annual “Community Planting Event.” Every April for the past couple of years SIPI’s preschool children have planted corn, melons, and chile peppers. This event involves children, families, and staff members of both SIPI and the Youth Development Incorporated (YDI) Head Start.
Internships, like scholarships, are an important piece of a student’s higher education process. Internships provide students with opportunities to improve their skills and confidence while allowing them to build relationships in their professional fields. Unfortunately, not all students have the opportunity to work as an intern.
Spring is in full bloom here at the Northwest Indian College (NWIC) Early Leaning Center, and the College Fund’s Restorative Teachings Early Childhood Education (ECE) Initiative is beginning to take shape. We are fortunate to live in a part of the country where the seasonal changes are so dramatic and each transition brings such a feeling of change to our surroundings.
The Southwestern Indian Polytechnic Institute’s (SIPI) Early Childhood program, together with the Youth Development Incorporated (YDI) happily launched their Restorative Teachings initiative on April 26, 2016. SIPI’s initiative seeks to develop a campus wide community that is inclusive of SIPI staff, faculty, students and the YDI Head Start. The collaborative initiative will focus on providing educational opportunities that support knowledge in the areas of health/ wellness and economic security.
Prior to joining the College Fund Ms. White Hat worked for Sanford Research in Sioux Falls, South Dakota as a project evaluator, where she oversaw and conducted research using a capacity-building approach to benefit regional tribal nations.
Bridget Skenadore, the American Indian College Fund’s Native Arts and Culture Project Coordinator, had the opportunity this week to participate in the Sisseton Wahpeton College’s Wokape’ Parfleche Workshop. Parfleche was used by tribes in the Plains as rawhide containers to store food and personal belongings.
In September of 2015, Bridget Skenadore, Native Arts and Culture Project Coordinator, presented at the 2016 International Conference of Indigenous Archives, Libraries and Museums conference hosted by the Association of Tribal Archives, Libraries and Museums (ATALM) in Washington, DC. The annual conference allows of an exchange of dialogue between Indigenous organizations, museums and libraries “who work to protect and advance cultural sovereignty
I attended Blackfeet Community College for a year and a half, where I learned of this internship opportunity through the American Indian College Fund as a Tribal College and University research intern. I knew that a new journey was starting anew. I was excited, nervous, but mostly ready to take that step.
My name is Cassandra Harden. I am a graduated from Southwestern Indian Polytechnic Institute (SIPI) with an associate’s degree in early childhood education who is currently working as a Tribal College and University (TCU) research intern for the College Fund.
In the life of a parent, there is so much to keep up with that it can be easy to forget to slow down and enjoy the ride. I have to take a moment and remind myself that the children are only going to be this small once. Some day, my boys are going to be grown and start families of their own.
