Native Student and Faculty Experiences: Supportive Systems from the Outside

I write this as a non-Native ally . . . one who has worked as a system facilitator and served as a support base, instructor, and mentor for Native faculty and undergraduate and graduate students for almost thirty years. My decision to write for this special issue of the American Indian Quarterly is based upon my hope that by sharing some of my experiences, non-Natives—specifically, those who can provide the knowledge and support necessary for faculty and students to prosper in this setting—may be considered as allies. And, hopefully, my stories will provide the impetus for new initiatives.

The roles I have assumed in academic settings (some of my esteemed Native colleagues have honored me with the term elder) likely emanated out of my own background and experiences in academia as well as the good fortune to be in the right place at the right or wrong time. My early developmental influences, as well as my basic college education taught me to honor all humans and show respect for, and understanding of, all cultures. These influences also encouraged me to view social activism as a viable activity.

Unfortunately, my education also provided me with the opportunity to experience what it was like to work in a system where no one who looked like me served in the role of faculty or administrator. Female faculty were not present in the Department of Psychology at Berkeley during my years as an undergraduate or graduate student. When I began my first academic job at University First there were only two female faculty in the department (one soon left), and when I assumed the role of department head, there were no female department heads in a college of twenty-five departments. My peers had to be gathered from departments across the university. As early pioneers, we were instrumental in initiating a women's council, a group that was advisory to the president and could lobby regarding academic and personnel issues. We also were instrumental in starting a cross-campus program in women's studies. When considered for tenure, several faculty members in my department challenged the validity of research articles I had published in the premier "women's" journal in my field. Also, sad to admit, as a female administrator I was, at times, assigned to protect/mentor female students in other departments that did not have female faculty who could assume such roles. The parallels to issues for Native faculty and students should be very clear here.

Very early in my career at University First the Department of Psychology began an initiative to build an ethnic minority graduate training program. I became very involved in this effort from the beginning. The department obtained funding from the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) to build the program; these funds paid for a professional staff person to manage the program (additional monies provided stipends for clinical psychology students). The goal was to build a program that would train all students, specifically ethnic minority students, such that they could work with individuals of all cultures, specifically their own culture, as well as have the option to focus their scholarly activity on ethnic minority issues and populations. As we built this program, it became apparent that whereas other psychology departments in the country recruited individuals from a narrow range of ethnic groups, we were very successful in recruiting and training Latino and Native American students (such specialization was very consistent with the population in the state). As time passed, the department became very well known for the program; I have coauthored several publications on the program per se and on training clinical psychologists who were Native American. When nimh funding disappeared, Patricia Roberts Harris funding was obtained for our students. At the time I retired from University First, we had trained the largest number of psychologists who are Native in the country; many of these graduates...