University of Colorado officials are taking greater notice of indigenous students who might attend the state's premier university. The efforts are seemingly linked with CU's need to move past the recent firing of Ward Churchill, the controversial CU professor, a self-proclaimed Cherokee, who was ultimately dismissed in June for academic research misconduct.
This fall, CU awarded 12 scholarships, each in the amount of $10,000, to Native undergraduate students as part of the newly created First Nations Scholarship program. The awards - which are given to out-of-state students belonging to federally recognized tribes - are unprecedented in the history of CU's recruiting relationship with Native students.
CU's new scholarships will hopefully reinvigorate the Native campus community. Already, the scholarships have helped the university claim its largest freshman class ever, with a total of 55 Native students, a 112 percent increase over last year.
But if CU and other universities around the country wanted to really increase Native student enrollment, they would start by honoring the geographical, contemporary and migratory history of all tribes connected to the state. Land-grant colleges should take specific notice.
The schools could use that information to offer in-state tuition rates to Native students.
As a recent two-day guest lecturer at CU's School of Journalism, I was invited to speak with several university officials, including a vice chancellor and college dean, about ways to increase the number of Native students on campus.
Like many schools across the country, out-of-state tuition gets in CU's recruitment path. Today, students outside Colorado borders pay $22,000 in tuition and fees. It costs about $8,000 more just to live in Boulder. My husband, also a CU graduate, is still paying off student loans acquired as an out-of-state student.
I lived in Denver for a year before applying to CU, otherwise I wouldn't have been able to afford tuition.
If the school wants to make tuition affordable to students from tribes outside Colorado, I suggest CU officials take the lead offered by the University of Nebraska's Board of Regents. In 1994, the board agreed to offer in-state tuition to students from any federally recognized tribe that had a historical or contemporary connection to Nebraska.
The end result: Qualified applicants belonging to one of 25 tribes became eligible for in-state tuition. And that included all undergraduate and professional programs at three campuses - Kearney, Lincoln and Omaha. So potentially an Arapaho student living in California could receive in-state tuition at the University of Nebraska's Medical Center in Omaha.
The other tribes who made Nebraska's list: Arikara, Blackfeet, Northern Cheyenne, Southern Cheyenne, Comanche, Crow, Hidatsa, Iowa, Jicarilla Apache, Kickapoo, Kiowa, Mandan, Missouria, Omaha, Otoe, Pawnee, Ponca, Potawatomi, Sac and Fox, Winnebago, Dakota, Lakota, Nakota and Santee Sioux.
In-state tuition not only makes college affordable to more Native students, but also increases the odds of securing a seat in the classroom. At least 85 percent of all students accepted into the University of Nebraska's medical school - which offers 17 programs - are from Nebraska.
This year, more than 1,000 students applied for one of the medical programs, but only 122 students were accepted.
Today, there are fewer than 10 Native students at NU's Medical Center.
Nebraska's Board of Regents revealed a progressive thought process when they agreed to passing on in-state tuition costs to students from tribes with ties to the state. The act stands as a wonderful commemoration of the indigenous people who lived on the land before white settlement.
Tens of millions of acres - tribal ancestral homelands - were lost to white settlers and state governments through graft and thievery. Tribes throughout the country were unwillingly relocated and marched thousands of miles from their traditional hunting and gathering areas.
Native people have never received just compensation for their displacement. Instead, many land-related injustices continue.
A Native homeowner living on a reservation in a state such as Wisconsin, California or Wyoming is obligated to pay property taxes to the local government if their home isn't located on land held in trust by the federal government.
That's just one example of how the disenfranchisement continues.
As many tribal colleges work hard to educate tribal citizens, states could lighten the load by making tuition affordable for students who plan to transfer to a four-year state college program. Tuition waivers would also allow many Native students to reconnect with ancestral lands.
For example, a Seminole from Oklahoma could attend the University of Florida at no extra cost.
In-state tuition would be a small gesture to right some old wrongs.
Jodi Rave covers Native issues for the Missoulian and other Lee Enterprises newspapers. She can be reached at 1-800-366-7186, Ext. 299, or at jodi.rave@lee.net.
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