Native Students Stepping Forward:
Dollar General Adult Education Program
2014 – Ongoing
About The Program
The American Indian College Fund’s Native Students Stepping Forward: Dollar General Adult Education Program, previously known as the Dollar General American Indian and Alaska Native Literacy and Adult Education Program, addresses a critical gap in the education pathway, empowering underserved Native people to gain the foundational literacy skills needed to prepare for and obtain high school equivalency (HSE) credentials and pursue post-secondary education and meaningful career pathways.
Like the Dollar General Literacy Foundation (DGLF), the program’s primary funder, supporting it at up to $300,000 annually, Native Students Stepping Forward is committed to helping individuals of all ages receive the educational foundation they need to succeed in post-secondary education opportunities or the workforce. Through tribal college and university (TCU)-implemented programming, this work seeks to strategically expand services and resources to achieve measurable outcomes in ABE progression and HSE program enrollment, retention, and completion. In a continuous effort to value the whole student, the program aims to assess and address students’ needs to succeed, encourages culturally relevant programming elements, promotes visibility of HSE students at TCUs, and supports college and career readiness programming components. TCU grantee partners also regularly engage across the cohort in a Community of Practice (CoP) to share best practices and challenges, strengthen programming, and examine holistic impact on students and communities.
High School Equivalency Visibility Project
The American Indian College Fund engaged three TCU high school equivalency (HSE) partners for the HSE Visibility Project, featuring the stories of HSE students and graduates in a social media campaign throughout winter and spring of 2024.
2022 High School Equivalency Program Convening
Grantees
Lac Courte Oreilles Ojibwe University
Northwest Indian College
Oglala Lakota College
Saginaw Chippewa Tribal College
Salish Kootenai College
Sinte Gleska University
Southwestern Indian Polytechnic Institute
Tohono O'odham Community College
Related Blogs
Spring Resurgence: GED classrooms open to students
The Oglala Lakota College Community Continuing Education/GED department is slowly transitioning out of online-only programming as the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic lessen. Now more than one GED student at a time can be in the college centers, as long as there is still only one student and tutor per classroom.
Sinte Gleska University GED Tutor Comes Full Circle
by Sherman Marshall, SGU Adult Basic Education Director For Debbie Burnette, joining Sinte Gleska University’s (SGU) Adult Basic Education (ABE) department in March 2020 was like coming home. Debbie’s connection with the ABE department goes back to 1979 when she...
Tohono O’odham Community College’s First Student to Complete the College Credit Pathway for High School Equivalency
TOCC recently had its first student complete the CCP. Monique started the GED program in the summer of 2018. Monique had dropped out of high school three years earlier and says the bad learning environment made it difficult to care about her education.
Motivation and Perseverance
By Kateri Montileaux, OLC GED Director Although TCUs are still dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic along with the rest of the world, Oglala Lakota College (OLC) has continued to make a positive impact in its communities with the Dollar General American Indian and...
