Volume 37, No. 4 – Summer 2026
A grant from one of the largest donors in the country has proven transformative for the American Indian Higher Education Consortium, impacting tribal college student success through new programming and technical assistance.
Since 1989, the American Indian College Fund has raised millions of dollars for tribal colleges and their students. In this special compendium, the organization’s resource development team shares best practices and guidance for fundraising, marketing, and beyond.
Tribal college leaders have always been innovative and tenacious. Such qualities were instrumental in the founding of the American Indian College Fund.
Longtime tribal college president Tom Shortbull discusses how Oglala Lakota College built one of the most impressive endowments in all of higher education.
Play Audio
In 2025, the current administration proposed to zero out the Institute of American Indian Arts’ funding. In response, IAIA’s Office of Institutional Communications crafted a message of hope that helped gain support and ultimately save the day.
At CMN, early grassroots fundraising meant staff and faculty wore more than one hat. Their hard work enabled the college to build a highly effective institutional advancement office.
“While stopping to take a break from running around Grandma’s, I felt the need to look out to the wood line, just across the road out front. A few seconds went by and that is when it emerged from the forest…”
In case you were unable to attend, here are some highlights from this year’s AIHEC student conference.
The president of Navajo Technical University and chair of AIHEC’s board of directors stresses the importance and challenges of fundraising and resource development.
Steven Peach
University of Oklahoma Press (2024)
225 pages
Review by Mekko Tyner
By Rae Rose and Aly McKnight
Dial books for Young Readers (2025)
41 Pages
Review by Deborah His Horse Is Thunder
By Robert W. Galler Jr.
University of Nebraska Press (2025)
416 pages
Review by Carmelita Lamb
By Tiffany Midge
University of Nebraska Press (2024)
212 pages
Review by Elizabeth A. Roastingear
MENU
