Wichita (and Affiliated Tribes), Kiowa Tribe of Oklahoma, and Cheyenne River Sioux
Age: 21
I’m a Music Education major attending The University of Oklahoma. I’ve always been into sketching and I do commission artwork when I’m not studying music. Until this past year and a half I was never really into societal issues and American Indian and US citizenship issues until I took a expository writing class over Citizenship (US focused). Taking that class was a real eye opener was I spent much of my time researching citizenship and particularly American Indian citizenship. From then on I’ve dedicated my free time to learn more and write my ideas for all to read.
It’s about sharing ones’ “value” in order to continue growth in their culture/country. As Native Youths we are following the footsteps of our ancestors who contributed their ideas/thoughts to improve said culture/country, so should we. The phrase “I count” spoke to me as “rather than being a number, I’m someone that has value and is significant. We belong to our culture/country as citizens and should feel accepted. Today we struggle with that idea. In order to feel accepted we should share our ideas/thoughts more to improve our culture/country and create growth so that one day we can achieve absolute acceptance.