Latest news with #TheMissoulian
Yahoo
17-06-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
A 2,000-Acre Montana Ranch With 20 Private Ski Runs Lists for $24 Million
If you've ever dreamed of owning a ski resort—but without the crowds, the lift lines, or the pesky permitting process—there's a ranch in Montana that might check every box. Just 20 minutes south of Missoula, nestled in the foothills of Lolo Peak, a sprawling 1,981-acre property known as Lolo Ranch has just hit the market asking $24 million. The best part? It comes with over 20 professionally designed ski runs already carved into the mountainside. Back in the mid-2000s, the ranch was the site of an ambitious plan to create a full-scale luxury ski resort. The then-owner, a local named Tom Maclay, envisioned slopeside lodges, shops, and high-end housing but ran into regulatory roadblocks with the U.S. Forest Service. After years of stalled permits, the project fell apart, the bank foreclosed, and the land was quietly auctioned off for $22.5 million in 2014, The Missoulian reported. What remains a decade later is a rare piece of recreational infrastructure: dozens of smoothed and cleared trails, winding from elevations near 6,000 feet down through forested ridges and open pastures. More from Robb Report Bill Koch's World-Class Wine Collection Just Sold for a Record $28.8 Million at Auction Inside a Luxe New Resort and Spa That Just Opened on the Greek Island of Crete A $12.4 Million Home Perched Above the Ocean Hits the Market in Martha's Vineyard RELATED: Why the Ultra-Wealthy Are Betting Big on America's Luxury Ranch Estates Today, Lolo Ranch is better suited for private use. There are no lifts, but snowmobiles or snowcats can easily ferry skiers to the top. 'On a good snow year, you could be there shredding for a couple months,' listing broker Deke Tidwell of Hall and Hall tells Mansion Global. In the off-season, the trails make for phenomenal mountain biking. The rest of the ranch is equally impressive. With five bedrooms and six baths, the rustic 5,000-square-foot lodge has plenty of room to host a large group. There are outbuildings for livestock; approximately 155 acres are under pivot irrigation, and the property holds extensive water rights sourced from multiple waterways, including McClain Creek, which runs right through the middle of the land. RELATED: John Huston's Former L.A. Ranch Has a Miniature Disney Railroad, and It Just Listed for $20 Million Thanks to its location at the base of the Bitterroot Mountains, Lolo Ranch borders over three miles of public land, offering direct access to the Lolo National Forest and the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness—one of the largest roadless areas in the Lower 48. Several alpine lakes lie just beyond the property line, reachable by foot, bike, or high-clearance vehicle. Wildlife is abundant here, but elk are the undisputed stars. 'The largest resident elk herd in the northern Bitterroot Valley lives here year-round,' Tidwell adds. 'They don't go anywhere because they're so happy.' Infrastructure from the failed resort plan—including underground power, miles of roads, and graded trails—opens the door for future development. But the land isn't burdened by a conservation easement, so the next owner can choose whether to build, conserve, or simply enjoy a very scenic version of of Robb Report The 10 Priciest Neighborhoods in America (And How They Got to Be That Way) In Pictures: Most Expensive Properties Click here to read the full article.
Yahoo
27-01-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Vital yet undervalued: Funding shortfalls stunt growth, progress at Montana tribal colleges
Carly Graf and Nora MabieThe Missoulian This is the final story in a series 'Education for a nation' observing the vital roles Tribal Colleges and Universities play in revitalizing language and culture, and fueling local workforces and economies in Montana. Republished with permission from The Missoulian. BOZEMAN — It was February 1978. A handful of tribal college leaders convened in Washington, D.C., to advocate for legislation that would forever change tribal communities nationwide. While a few Tribal Colleges and Universities (TCUs) had sprung up around the country — including Blackfeet Community College and Fort Peck Community College in Montana — the institutions teetered on shoestring budgets. Classes were held in church basements, trailers or school gymnasiums. What would become the Tribally Controlled Community College Assistance Act guaranteed federal funding for the institutions, which provided essential education and cultural revitalization in their communities. Tribal leaders had long told Congress that TCUs were chronically underfunded. Mainstream lawmakers in D.C. offered fierce opposition, suggesting the bill was a waste of money. Wayne Stein traveled to the Capitol as a tribal college advocate. He distinctly remembers a meeting with a White House staffer — and not because it was a positive experience. When asked how she came to oversee the issue, a legislative staffer told the group she'd been assigned domestic issues starting with the letters 'H,' 'I' and 'J.' The tribal college bill fell under 'I' for 'Indian.' 'All of us were looking at each other,' Stein recalled. 'I remember thinking, 'Holy crap. Holy crap. This can't be real.' But she didn't even blink. … So then we proceeded to educate her about Indians and tribal colleges.' It took extensive advocacy, education and politicking, but President Jimmy Carter signed the Tribally Controlled Community College Assistance Act into law that October. 'Without (it), there wouldn't be any tribal colleges, hardly,' Stein told the Montana State News Bureau. The federal bill ensured TCUs survived, but not that they thrived. Today, more than 40 years later, tribal colleges remain chronically underfunded compared with community colleges or Historically Black Colleges and Universities. Year after year they're asked to do more with less. While the injection of federal coronavirus relief dollars offered a glimpse of what's possible when these schools are adequately resourced, future funding remains in limbo. Tribal leaders in Montana expect continued funding debates during this year's legislative session, and there is growing concern over federal dollars with a new presidential administration set to take over. Tribal colleges rely on a complicated mix of funding sources. Getting enough money requires relentless self-advocacy and scrupulous accounting of the government budget process. Administrators say they fight for every dollar they get from federal or state lawmakers, but still must rely on a patchwork of grants and private funding sources to keep the lights on. Trappings of the classic college campus are swapped for humble facilities. Endowments are replaced by deferred maintenance costs as a budget line. 'We're not known beyond the states that we serve,' said David Yarlott, who served as president of Little Big Horn College for 22 years. 'We always have to go out and promote ourselves and try to convince other representatives and senators about our importance.' TCUs receive on average roughly 70 percent of their total funding from the federal government. Congress also offers funding to a host of minority-serving higher education institutions such as Historically Black Colleges and Universities. Unique to tribal colleges, though, is the federal government's trust responsibility — codified by dozens of treaties — to provide education to tribes. The 1978 law maps out a formula, albeit obscure, for how much funding tribal colleges should receive. Most of the federal dollars for tribal colleges flow through the Bureau of Indian Education (BIE). The law calls for the colleges to receive $8,000 for every 'full-time enrolled Indian student,' adjusted for inflation year-over-year. But Congress has failed to fund colleges at that level for decades. What's more, the BIE doesn't even spend all the money it's authorized to use. When congressional authorization increased the amount of money the BIE could spend on each Indian student from $6,000 to $8,000 between 2005 and 2015, the agency only upped its per-student spending from $4,447 to $6,355. State legislatures are not required by law to provide any funding for tribal colleges, and most do not choose to. Recognizing persistent gaps between operational costs and federal funding, President Joe Biden established a commission to improve tribal colleges in 2021. Yet the BIE budget for the 2024 fiscal year included a meager $87.9 million to be disbursed among 29 tribal colleges nationally. TCU leaders say their federal allocation comes under threat with each new presidential administration. Janine Pease, founding president of Little Big Horn College, said teachers had to take second jobs during the Reagan years. 'We're talking about this little drop in the bucket,' Pease said of federal allocations. 'And we're saying, 'Please, give us two drops!'' The Montana Legislature does not provide any additional funding for these American Indian students; however, it is one of only a few state governments that gives tribal colleges money for non-Native students — allocating up to $3,280 per enrolled non-Native student. Because the state allocates less money per non-Native student than the federal government allocates per Native student, TCUs with greater shares of non-Native students — like Salish Kootenai College and Fort Peck Community College — ultimately receive less total funding to cover their costs than TCUs that enroll greater numbers of Native American students. Members of Montana's American Indian Caucus and other supportive lawmakers have tried to make the case for why the state should increase funding for TCUs. Rep. Tyson Running Wolf, D-Browning, proposed legislation in 2021 that would have made $3,280, the current non-beneficiary ceiling, the minimum allocation per non-Native student. It also created an adjustment to make sure funding rose with inflationary costs. By comparison, the Legislature funds full-time resident students at three of Montana's community colleges at roughly double the rate. Running Wolf's bill ultimately died in committee. 'To me, it (felt like) they didn't even hear what I had to say,' he recalled. 'It was like they had already figured out they were going to kill it. … Maybe it was a misunderstanding or maybe it was just the atmosphere of that (legislative) session.' Sen. Susan Webber, D-Browning, says the unequal funding for tribal colleges 'comes down to discrimination.' 'The Montana University System never thought that Indians could achieve a higher education or a higher degree,' she said. 'So they never bothered to put a school here, and now they're discriminating against us because we had to go to different measures to get a school on an Indian reservation.' Webber said there's a misconception among lawmakers that tribes will mismanage state funds, despite TCUs being subject to audits and accreditation like any other higher education institution. 'We have an annual audit, everything…,' she said. 'Yet, they walk in and say we'll mismanage funds. Do they say that to the Montana University System? Do they say that to Bozeman? No.' While many colleges can raise tuition rates to close the gap between operational costs and public funding, that's not a good option for tribal colleges. The average cost to attend a tribal college in Montana is notably lower than what an in-state resident would pay to enroll at any MUS campus. Most students at TCUs face significant economic barriers such as extremely high rates of poverty and unemployment, a report from the American Council on Education says. An overwhelming majority are eligible for federal assistance based on income, but getting a loan is no easy feat in Indian Country. TCU grads are also less likely to earn high incomes and donate back to their alma mater, striking another funding stream that more mainstream colleges might enjoy. Stretched paper-thin, tribal colleges turn to nonprofits and foundations to close the gaps. Faculty and staff — already making less than they could at a community college, for example — take on the added burden of grant writing. Survival hinges on running dozens of ongoing grants at the same time. 'It's easy to get nostalgic, but once you start doing the work — which requires dealing with multiple systems: State, private, nonprofit — it's hard to get the funding,' said Elijah Hopkins from Fort Peck Community College. While the pandemic devastated tribal communities — killing Native Americans in Montana at a rate about 12 times greater than their white neighbors — it showed what's possible for tribal colleges when money is no issue. Tribal colleges received hundreds of millions of dollars in COVID-19 relief. Awash with cash, they could pay for things that had only ever been ideas. Blackfeet Community College forgave old tuition debt, purchased laptops for students and paid for broadband access. Chief Dull Knife College reduced and, in some cases, eliminated tuition fees. Fort Peck Community College invested in improved online teaching options. Stone Child College actually paid people to go to school. 'When you look at larger universities, they didn't spend their COVID funds directly on students,' said Karla Bird, the then-president of BCC. 'They probably thought about their funding in a different way than tribal colleges did.' Across the colleges, enrollment increased — even boomed, according to administrators. At FPCC, around 700 students participated in some kind of schooling. It led to the largest graduating class in the school's nearly 50-year history. 'I think what is a really unique narrative is you see success rates at tribal colleges during COVID that you don't see at other universities,' Bird said. 'One of their questions was, 'Why?' And to me, it's because tribal colleges finally received resources.' When their communities were in crisis, people flocked to the local tribal college for support. It showed what TCU graduates and staff have long known — these campuses transcend the education they provide. They serve as the backbone of their communities, a trusted place where people can ask for help and receive it. But as those federal dollars dried up, so too did the enrollment boom. At FPCC and elsewhere, the number of students has since dropped, leaving staff with a visceral example of the promise of TCUs but without the funds to reach it. TCUs serve as a springboard for more opportunity, both for the students who attend and the systems with which they interact. Past and present threats to tribal college resources — including some uncertainty about how the Montana Legislature might reduce funds in the next biennium budget — suggest this impact may not be fully appreciated by some. Students can earn credits to eventually enter the Montana University System (MUS) and the more specialized degrees it offers. Some students will earn their associate's degree at a tribal college then head to an MUS campus off the reservation for a bachelor's. Agreements allow for credit-sharing so students don't have to repeat classes they already took. Others take advantage of '2+2' pathways. Students complete the first two years of a program at a tribal college and finish their degree at a four-year campus. Examples include social work degrees, business entrepreneurship and early childhood education. Cecilia Helgeson, for example, studies environmental studies at Aaniiih Nakoda College on the Fort Belknap Reservation. She dreams of going to MSU Northern or MSU Bozeman for animal science and eventually make her way to veterinary school. Helgeson wants to return to the reservation to work as a vet with large animals to help people like her grandpa and uncle who must travel 45 minutes to the closest clinic. 'You look around now, it's amazing how many Native American people have college degrees, not only associate's or bachelor's but there are master's degrees and doctorate degrees,' said Carol Juneau, who was instrumental in the founding of Blackfeet Community College. Opportunity isn't only defined by a four-year degree, a reality TCUs understand better than most. Many jobs require a high school diploma. Native students attending high schools on reservations are less likely to graduate and more likely to drop out as compared with non-Native peers. To address the disparity, the 2019 Legislature awarded each of the seven tribal colleges in Montana with one-time only funding of $25,000 to support HiSET, the state's high school equivalency exam. Results varied. Completion rates ranged from 20 percent to 88 percent depending on the tribal college. Administrators told lawmakers in September 2024 that the current HiSET allocation wasn't enough to pay for the salary of a test proctor. They said some enrollees struggled to pay for gas or balance a full-time job with the exam prep, while others would pause studies to help with family crises. Rather than brainstorm fixes to challenges, policymakers proposed slashing funding for HiSET at TCUs this biennium — a move that has drawn criticism from tribal college advocates. The suggestion is reflected in Gov. Greg Gianforte's budget proposal that will be debated during this legislative session. A spokesperson from the Office of the Commissioner of Higher Education said the recommendation comes from legislators who sat on the interim education budget committee. OCHE has suggested in the past that it may be more sensible for ongoing HiSET funding to flow through a separate adult education program overseen by the state rather than through tribal colleges, the spokesperson said. Members of the Montana American Indian Caucus suggested they would fight to fund the HiSET program during budget negotiations, calling the proposed cuts another example of the government's quick willingness to take resources from Indian Country rather than spend money to support it. This story was created with the support of the Higher Education Media Fellowship at the Institute for Citizens & Scholars. The Fellowship supports new reporting into issues related to postsecondary career and technical education.
Yahoo
26-01-2025
- General
- Yahoo
‘Build a better rez'
Carly Graf and Nora MabieThe Missoulian This is the second story in a series 'Education for a nation' observing the vital roles Tribal Colleges and Universities play in revitalizing language and culture, and fueling local workforces and economies in Montana. Republished with permission from The Missoulian. PABLO — On a bright, crisp October morning, seven students from Salish Kootenai College headed to class for their final exam. It wouldn't take place in a classroom, but rather a nondescript parking lot outfitted with a movable trailer. The students showed their skills through the high-pitched, grating sound of the angle grinder, so ear-splitting it nearly drowned out the whir of traffic on Highway 93, the main road through the southernmost part of the Flathead Indian Reservation. If they passed, they would obtain a welding certificate, opening the door to stable, high-paying jobs that are not easy to come by for most people in their community. 'These guys all could go to work as soon as they get out of this class,' says Vic Desautel, the instructor. He says he gets calls every day about open jobs for the soon-to-be-grads, opportunities ranging from big stadium projects to nuclear power plants, prefabricated builds, pipefitting and more. American Indians have the lowest college enrollment rate of any racial group in the country, according to data from the National Center for Education Statistics. Federal data shows higher rates of unemployment among Native communities compared to the national average. Most jobs on reservations pay meager wages and lack opportunities for career growth. Even though the Flathead Reservation is an outlier, home to a larger population of non-Native residents and offering more economic opportunity than its peers, people still struggle to find work that catapults them to greater earnings. On reservations, if not working for the tribes or schools, a gas station clerk or a grocery store cashier might be the only option. Leaving the community could be possible, but that likely means putting potentially hundreds of miles between family members. Completion of the SKC's welding course gives graduates a near-guarantee of earning more than $20 an hour in an industry with a seemingly endless demand for workers. They can work for themselves or join a union and hop on jobs all over the country. Tribal Colleges and Universities (TCUs) such as SKC provide essential workforce development for their communities, often creating direct pathways to jobs that benefit the reservation. They also create a more sustainable workforce because Native graduates are more likely to stay in their own communities than someone from the outside. TCUs themselves even benefit, as students complete projects that the campus needs to get done in the name of work experience. SKC welders, for example, gain experience repairing heavy machinery parts and the college doesn't have to pay for the labor. Central to the tribal college mission is equipping future generations with skills to bolster the local economy and the tribe's capacity, and to provide a more effective learning environment for Native students compared with their Montana University System counterparts. Wayne Stein, a TCU expert who led the Native American Studies department at Montana State University in Bozeman, says tribal colleges are the best thing that has happened to Indian Country in a century. 'There are many (benefits) and they're pretty visible,' he said. 'The upside of having a tribal college in your community is huge, and we know that in Montana because we have seven of them.' Reservations have lower median household incomes and higher shares of the population below the poverty line. TCUs offer the chance to get training that directly translates into job opportunity. A 2024 report from the Montana Department of Labor and Industry concludes that a greater share of people on all but one of the reservations have achieved a two-year associate degree as compared with the statewide average, which it attributes largely to the offerings at TCUs. It's not enough to simply create vocational programs. TCU students are more likely to come from situations of poverty or be parents and caretakers themselves, so tribal colleges work to make their pre-professional programs accessible to students facing additional barriers. All of Montana's TCUs offer child care, food assistance and scholarships for things like textbooks. Faculty is more flexible to account for challenges like family deaths to suicide — which occur at higher rates for Native people — so students can still obtain their degree. Some will provide housing or gas stipends. When Shawncee Brave Rock first heard about the SKC course, the idea of becoming a welder had never crossed his mind. He fought fire for nine years all around the Mountain West, but now has a 6-month-old son. That brings a whole new kind of love — and a lot more bills. After eight weeks of the class, Brave Rock's vision for his future has completely changed. He wants to operate his own mobile welding business to fix fences and help with car repairs around the reservation. 'I never touched a welder before and I really like it,' he said. 'I think I'd enjoy doing this full time.' Welding students get a $125 daily stipend to pay for their time, much of which is spent in the mobile trailer that often reaches triple-digit temperatures. It's unglamorous. They're usually covered in grease and dressed head-to-toe in thick, stiff workwear in the beating sun. But they return home every night, a boon for Brave Rock and others who have families of their own. 'The more time on the hood, the better,' says Chris Brown, 20, dad to a little girl and an avid learner of new welding skills. He spearheaded the class art project — a dreamcatcher made of scrap metal, the feathers initialed by each student. It's a far cry from when Desautel earned his welding credentials. Growing up on an Indian reservation in Washington, Desautel said his only options were jail or learning a trade. The way to learn a trade was to get off the reservation. He enrolled in a course in Chicago for Native Americans, but only about half made it through the program. Some stumbled without their support systems; others had to return home for family obligations. 'You can bring it to the reservations,' Desautel said of the traveling welding course he now teaches. 'They are able to learn but they don't have to leave home right away.' Tribal colleges allow Native learners to acquire new skills while staying tied to their culture and community — and at a far lower price tag. The average price of in-state tuition at a public college for the 2021-2022 school year was $10,388. By comparison, the American Indian Higher Education Consortium calculated the average cost of tuition and fees during that same year at a tribal college to be $3,744. No matter the origin, this synergistic relationship is partly why TCU students are more likely to view their investment in higher education as worthwhile. A 2022 survey of TCU graduates by Gallup found 67 percent of respondents said their education at a tribal college was worth the cost, relative to 38 percent nationally. 'We are providing a service that the state university system is not doing,' said state Sen. Susan Webber, D-Browning. Each of Montana's seven tribal colleges has made job training a primary focus. It entices enrollees and bolsters local economies. Working in harmony, TCUs respond to the needs of the surrounding communities and invest in making those opportunities accessible for prospective students. 'As a community college, we have adaptability to assess and see what our local workforce needs and adapt our programs to opportunities,' said Craig Smith, the president of Fort Peck Community College. Stone Child College offers carpentry classes. Fort Peck Community College is piloting a program in tribal governance and administration. Chief Dull Knife College has courses in American Indian education and early childhood education to prepare new teachers to work on the reservation. Developing a workforce of people from the community who hope to stay close to home is critical to filling gaps on reservations, where everyone from public schools and health care facilities struggle to recruit and retain skilled workers. Some of these institutions try to attract outside professionals with financial incentives or other advancement opportunities, but the result is often a rotating cast of characters. Trust, already fragile due to decades of systemic violence against American Indian communities, is hard to build when the teacher changes halfway through the school year or a primary care provider leaves town. Around 74 percent of TCU graduates nationally end up employed on or near the reservation, according to the Gallup poll. They offer the possibility of a more sustainable solution to persistent workforce challenges. Gwynne White Quills is one of those students. Mom to seven kids, she graduated from Blackfeet Community College with her registered nursing license in May 2024. While studying, she continued to work as a nursing assistant at the Indian Health Service facility in Browning. It was normal for her to steal just a couple hours of shuteye as she juggled coursework, hospital night shifts and parenting. During the two-year program, White Quills relied on her husband for help with the kids and leaned on her teachers to make sure she absorbed the material and stayed on track. At BCC, she felt like more than just a student, and that allowed her to believe she could do it all. 'I don't think that I would have ever gotten my nursing degree if it was anywhere else other than here,' she said. White Quills passed the nursing boards shortly after graduating, officially making her a registered nurse. The BCC program is not yet accredited — though it aims to be by 2026 — so it took a bit longer for her to get hired as a nurse at the local Indian Health Service facility. Once she did, though, it marked the fulfillment of a lifelong dream for the 38-year-old. Although she had worked in skilled nursing facilities and as a nursing assistant on the reservation for years, she always thought this next step would be unattainable. Too many responsibilities. Too many mouths to feed. Not enough hours in the day. 'I am really looking forward to finally being able to do what I wanted to do,' White Quills said. 'When I look at where I'm at, where I work, I'm like, 'Man, this place is the reason I want to be a nurse.' Working here, working on this unit for my people, with my people, this is the reason why I wanted to be a nurse.' Residents of the Blackfeet Reservation face significant barriers to quality health care even as their community endures disproportionately high rates of chronic illness and premature death. The latest Community Health Assessment found that 26 percent of Blackfeet Reservation residents go to the emergency room rather than scheduling an appointment with a primary care provider, often due to long wait times. Another report from the American Medical Association found that American Indians account for just 0.3 percent of all physicians nationally despite a growing body of research which shows that patients with medical providers from the same background see improved trust and better outcomes. Now White Quills gets to play a role in helping address such vast inequities as a highly trained nurse in a health care setting that struggles to recruit qualified practitioners. She'll also understand the sensitivities of Native patients entering a mainstream medical system, knowing to ask permission before combing the hair of seniors, for example, or to inform patients about their options for traditional ceremony such as smudging or using sage in the hospital. 'Right now, I'm still kind of shocked and in awe that I actually did it,' White Quills said. 'That was the hardest thing I've ever had to do in my life.' There are countless stories of TCUs empowering Native people to progress their own careers, improve their earnings and boost self-confidence. All have ripple effects on their family and community more broadly. When Indian Country does better, the surrounding economies do, too. One report suggests that Montana's tribal communities contribute $1 billion annually to the state's economy. '(Tribal colleges have) lifted the spirit of people,' Stein said. 'For the first time, you have students who feel welcome in schools. … While tribal colleges aren't huge — they have between 100 and 300 students — 400 students, they do that year after year after year, and it starts to add up.' Renata Underwood experienced that transformation of spirit firsthand. Her story starts as a high schooler in Lodge Grass on the Crow Reservation with parents who were largely absent due to chronic struggles with substance use disorders. Simply getting herself up and off to school each morning on the 20-minute bus ride from the house in Crow Agency was a daunting task for the teen. It started with a few absences before snowballing into a pattern of missing school. Instead, Underwood would hang out with friends. Alcohol was pervasive. Eventually, she dropped out, and her dreams of being a lawyer were eclipsed by the basic needs of survival. Almost 20 years and four kids later, Underwood had moved to Hardin, a border town between the Crow and Northern Cheyenne reservations. She tried four different times to obtain her HiSET — the test equivalent of a high school diploma — through the local library and a community center in Billings, but failed every time. Underwood recalls feeling lost in the classes and confused about how to improve. Then, in 2023, her oldest daughter was set to graduate from high school. 'I thought, 'My baby is not going to graduate before me!'' Underwood said. A friend told her about the HiSET program at Little Big Horn College in Crow Agency. She could attend for free, and the HiSET adviser gave Underwood $40 to cover gas costs for the round-trip drive every time she visited campus for the course. After every practice exam, Underwood would receive private tutoring to identify how to up her scores. When she got her results, Underwood was driving in the car back from the grocery store. Her phone pinged, and Underwood's heart started to race with the thought that it could signal the arrival of her HiSET score. She had barely gotten through the first few sentences when she burst into tears. Even more than a year later, Underwood beams when she recounts this moment. 'I was crying like a big ol' baby,' she said. 'I couldn't believe I actually did something.' But Underwood didn't stop there. So enamored with the LBHC experience and the power of education, she went on to obtain her certified nursing assistant license in a one-year program. She encourages her kids and neighbors to pursue education. 'I got a taste and feel of LBHC, and I really like it,' she said. 'I didn't realize that I wasn't utilizing something that is such a great opportunity.' Next, Underwood plans to indulge the dreams of her teenage self by signing up for an American Indian policy class. Maybe one day she'll become a lawyer, after all. Underwood isn't pollyanna-ish about how hard life can be for her fellow Native people. But she does believe that if more people take steps toward an education or a new career path at LBHC, or another of the state's tribal colleges, they could create change for their community. 'Let's build a better rez,' she said. This story was created with the support of the Higher Education Media Fellowship at the Institute for Citizens & Scholars. The Fellowship supports new reporting into issues related to postsecondary career and technical education.
