Founding Member of AIHEC
Visits American Indian College Fund

John Emhoolah Jr. (Kiowa), one of the founding members of the American Indian Higher Education Consortium (AIHEC), paid a visit to the American Indian College Fund to discuss the roots of AIHEC and the American Indian College Fund's work.

Emhoolah was working as the associate dean of vocational education for Green River Community College in Auburn, Washington, when he was paid a visit by David Gipp, president of United Tribes Technical College, and asked if he would help AIHEC with their work developing the tribal college movement. Despite the fact that he had a job he loved with tenure, Emhoolah decided to go on board.

“We started with a Title III grant administered through the Department of Education,” he said. “After I came on board, I was responsible for writing the grant application each year…. When you work for a public college in education, everything is ready, and all you have to do is step in, but here [with AIHEC] we had to do everything. We trained the new board of trustees and got support from each tribe by going to tribal council meetings.”

“Tribes didn't have a main source of revenue that supported the college, so we got together and decided to develop legislation. The Indian Self Determination Act gave us a springboard to do something as Indian people. We knew what the state position was; they were not supporting our students or tribes. We keyed in on treaty obligations with the federal government for education,” he said.

The result? The legislation passed was the first of a kind. “From an Indian point of view, there never had been Indian legislation developed for and by Indians; usually when the federal government developed legislation it was to get more of what we had.”

He recalled the team was gathered in Niagara Falls , New York , for a conference when they heard the good news that the legislation had been past. “We celebrated! By then we had been through a lot, and had 12 colleges.”

Emhoolah said the beauty of what the Fund does is that “everyone comes from different tribes and everyone wants to contribute. Keep that effort going for Indian self-determination. That was the dream back then: to serve the Indian and give them an opportunity… I'm glad that you're here doing this work. Out on the reservation, if a student wants to go to school, at least they have hope now. When I was young there was no hope.”