Native American and Indigenous Studies (NAIS) Initiative Kinship Fund

Our mission is to build relationships. To that end, our fundraising goal is not aimed at raising a specific amount of money but engaging with families, alumni, faculty, staff and community members who are interested in Native American and Indigenous studies. We prioritize relationships and community building, and our outreach efforts seek to establish long-term support from across Long Island and beyond.

We are calling this effort a kinship fund. Kinship is how Indigenous peoples describe and practice the relationships that give meaning to the specific types of knowledge, politics and culture that constitute a community. Kinship is not just about genealogy or biology but how we put into practice the relationships that make us who we are. Our kinship fund will aid these practices and our engagement with the diverse communities that we support, both on campus and off.

Anyone who lives on Long Island has a relationship with Long Island’s Indigenous peoples. Our role is to help facilitate a deeper engagement and reciprocal relationships with those communities, their histories and their future possibilities. We invite supporters to think of a monthly contribution amount that can support our goal of continuing to build relationships and expand our programming into the future.

Background

The NAIS Initiative offers classes, programming and community outreach focused on the diversity of Native American and Indigenous experience, knowledge and culture. Since its founding in 2023, the initiative has hired two new faculty, and it is in the process of hiring two more. We launched a minor in Native American and Indigenous Studies in 2024, the first of its kind on Long Island. We have also invited community members, notable speakers, artists and scholars to share their knowledge and energy with the SBU community. Throughout, these efforts have been guided by our relationships with community leaders, including our steering committee composed of representatives from the Montaukett, Shinnecock, Setalcott, Unkechaug and Matinecock nations.

The NAIS Initiative Kinship Fund will support our programming in two concrete ways:

First, we would like to establish an elder-in-residence program that will allow us to be in community and dialogue with Indigenous leaders from the surrounding area. This program aims to support our ongoing minor and core courses and to allow students to learn from Indigenous leaders through experience and dialogue over the course of a semester.

Second, we would like to establish a fund to support continuing education programs with K-12 educators from across the region, bringing students and faculty, as well as guest speakers, culture bearers and artists, to diverse parts of Long Island to provide hands-on training in Native American and Indigenous studies. This effort will combine faculty and student research with community-based outreach and will offer Long Island’s secondary schools a way to deepen their understanding of Indigenous culture, history and politics.