Indigenous Engagement

NASPA's efforts to repair and re-center our work with our Indigenous Peoples community is a key part of our commitment to creating a more inclusive association and deepening capacity to serve Indigenous members and students across our programs, scholarship, and institutions. As NASPA President Kevin Kruger reflected in a November 2020 statement, the work is collaborative, intentional, and focused on repair, restoration, and growth. 

The Power and Place Symposium, launched in 2020, annually explores issues related to orientation, transition, retention, and other topics that impact the participation of Indigenous higher education communities. The symposiums include keynote presentations and panels, moderated sessions, and community reflection. The theoretical orientation for each supporting element of the Symposium is simultaneously grounded by the text Power and Place: Indian Education in America, co-authored by the late Vine Deloria, Jr. (Standing Rock Sioux Tribe) and current Haskell Indian Nations University faculty member Daniel Wildcat (Yuchi member of the Muscogee Nation of Oklahoma) and the NASPA Indigenous Peoples Knowledge Community leadership framework.

A significant Power and Place Symposium goal is to center, privilege, and promote Indigenous worldviews regarding orientation, transition, retention, and professional and leadership development experiences in higher education. The Symposium is hosted at the NASPA Annual Conference or the Conferences on Student Success in Higher Education and is intended for student affairs professionals, higher education scholars, allied educators, and anyone interested in questioning, reflecting, and imagining how Power and Place engender conditions for deepening Indigeneity in higher education.

The President's Implementation Committee on Indigenous Engagement and Inclusion has been charged with implementing recommendations from the December 2021 Indigenous Engagement Working Group report to the Board of Directors. Members of the Implementation Committee participate in one of five workstreams, focused on conference and event planning, partnerships with Indigenous-focused organizations, the Power and Place Symposium, engagement with Tribal Colleges and Universities and Native American-Serving Non-Tribal Institutions, and Indigenous mentorship.