As the American Indian Higher Education Consortium commemorates its 50th anniversary, we celebrate our leaders whose vision and perseverance have led us to the place of honoring our ancestors, living well in the present, and making decisions as they impact the next seven generations. As we learn more about culturally rooted scholarship, including developing our understanding of what it means to lead from an Indigenous and tribal perspective, those of us affiliated with tribally controlled education realize that we have many among us who represent the tribal epistemology that is so critical to our voices and our representation. Margaret Kovach, a Canadian plains Cree and Salteaux scholar, describes the role of tribal epistemology as the way that we as tribal people use our knowledge to inform how we live in the world. When we were invited to share stories about one of our tribal college presidents, we thought about how that person lived as a Sicangu Lakota wicasa and how our relationship with him celebrates his role.

We are honored to share the story of Wakinyan Wanbli, Eagle Thunder, a man who used his voice and his lived experiences to speak out on behalf of Indigenous people all over the world. Lionel Bordeaux served as the president of Sinte Gleska University (SGU) on the Rosebud reservation in South Dakota since 1973. He was the longest serving president at any college or university in the United States, but it was his leadership of the tribally controlled education movement that is his true legacy. Between the time we were asked to write this essay and before its publication, Lionel took his journey to the spirit world. We were struck by how meaningful the headline announcing his passing in the Tribal College Journal was: “Lionel Bordeaux Departs for the Spirit World.” Yes, he did, and he looked back, waved, smiled at us, and said, “Toksa ake, see you later.”

President Bordeaux had a legacy that he was committed to throughout his life, in his leadership as a tribal educator and advocate. It was a legacy of tribal college education and the self-determination it represents that is fulfilled everyday across the tribal college systems and which affects tribally controlled education at all levels—from early childhood through adult education. That legacy is a call to action: to continue our pursuit of our own tribal accreditation agencies, to align our institutions into a national tribal university, and to always strive for our tribally controlled institutions to be centers of community with strong cultural practices and engagement. We can look to his teachings as a path to our prosperity and cultural integrity through education.

There are many articles written about Lionel, so we wanted to share our personal experiences of working with him and knowing him as our relative. Lionel received many accolades during his long career and we know he appreciated the recognition, but we also know that he was driven by the desire for those who honored him to live up to their own leadership responsibilities by facilitating and leading change that supports tribal sovereignty and builds better lives for our children.

We pray that Lionel’s journey to be with our relatives in the spirit world is one of love and goodness. We remember his compassion, love, and courage. We pray for his family, especially his grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

CHERYL CRAZY BULL REMEMBERS…

I first “officially” met Lionel when I went to work at Sinte Gleska College in 1981. For the last 40-plus years, Lionel had been my friend and mentor. I learned about Indigenous visibility and voice from him at a time when those terms were not used by us. I am still learning from him as I think about the ways that he served his people. Lionel was deeply committed to our ownership of the educational processes and experiences of our people through our tribally controlled institutions.

When I was young, I listened to Lionel share the vision of the founders of tribal colleges and I watched him epitomize that vision through his advocacy. Their vision for us to strengthen our sovereignty and our self-determination through education and through advocacy and that education is woven throughout our lives, our decision-making, and our allocation of resources. Lionel, as one of our founders, was sharing his vision but he graciously and appropriately attributed the vision of tribal education to the elders, activists, and spiritual leaders who founded our institutions. Over time, I came to realize that his experiences and the narrative through which he shared those experiences was rooted in the very qualities of decolonization and indigenizing that we, as educators, want today.

Our people are warriors and Lionel epitomized the modern Native warrior’s strength and dedication. I remember the first executive director of Sinte Gleska College, Jerry Mohatt, telling me that Lionel was pursued for the role of president because of his Lakota speaking skills and his reputation as a fighter, as someone who would stand up for the people. Lionel frequently shared the story of how he came to the college through the outreach of one of the founders, Stanley Red Bird, and Jerry. Embedded in that story is the knowledge of the founders that the people needed someone with the strength to go into the battle that they knew they faced to establish and build their own college. In that story is the heart of our institutions, our warrior spirit and the spirituality that underpins it. Lionel was that warrior, and his years of visionary leadership proves that.

To lead today means bringing our traditional knowledge into alignment with current resources toward our vision of the future. Lionel always reminded us that the tribal college movement emerged from a vision of tribal nation building and that tribal colleges have a responsibility to serve their people with compassion and in as many ways as possible. At a time when we had very scarce resources, I remember Lionel holding fast to his commitment to have coffee ready in our lobby every day because he said that for many of our people the only time they would have a college experience was when they came into our building to have coffee, and that maybe it would inspire someone to take classes.

Today, Indigenous scholars write about and discuss tribal epistemologies which are the ways that we know the world from our own learning and experiences. As a leader, Lionel’s actions and beliefs were deeply rooted in his own identity and knowledge. I’ve been thinking that the narratives and teachings that he shared emerged from his upbringing along the Little White River with his grandparents, his boarding school experiences, and what it was like for him to go to college and to work for the Bureau of Indian Affairs. What he taught about leadership came from walking the halls of Congress, convincing legislators with no knowledge of Native people and no real interest in helping that supporting tribal colleges was a great idea—doing so while sneaking up on them with his commitment to education as a trust responsibility. I think of all the times he used diplomacy and his “fighting the good fight” words to convince his colleagues that we should join together as AIHEC, the College Fund, and WINHEC. He was the person who stood up and said to a major funder, “it is all of us or none of us,” showing the world, once again, that we are united as Native people and as TCUs.

I learned from Lionel that vision and love go hand-in-hand and that to be a visionary leader means you must love your people and you must love yourself. He often said a leader must be their own best friend and must surround themselves with the best people. That is how our ancestors thrived, our leaders kept their own counsel, praying for guidance, and then they asked their people to bring their best selves to whatever was in front of them. All of us, educators, advocates, students, and their families, must continue on the path that Lionel and other visionary leaders laid for us. We must do that because as Lionel often said, “if it is to be, it is up to me.”

EMILY R. WHITE HAT REMEMBERS…

Growing up in the Tribal College Movement, more specifically at Sinte Gleska University, I’d known who Lionel was for most of my life. Lionel and my late father, Albert White Hat Sr., were classmates at St. Francis Mission, later became colleagues at Sinte Gleska University, and remained lifelong friends. Lionel was a relative whose approach to interactions was rooted in relationship. I think about being at the spring AIHEC meeting in Rapid City in 2017, when Lionel’s daughter, Deb, was also in attendance and Lionel was so happy that his daughter and Albert’s daughter were both there, supporting the tribal college movement in our roles, and insisted that we get our picture taken together. The continuity of relationship and leadership meant a lot to him.

As a teenager I had a deep interest in tribal government and sovereignty and became acquainted with Lionel in his roles as an elected tribal leader and tribal college president. Lionel served as a tribal council representative for the Antelope community, representing not only the community but the Sicangu Lakota Oyate. When Lionel served on council, he was one of the few representatives who spoke fluent Lakota. As a lifelong language learner, you listen to and remember those who speak Lakota. By serving on tribal council, Lionel brought visibility to the importance of education for our people and awareness of Sinte Gleska University. Lionel was a visionary leader, always knowing and seeing that life could be better for our Sicangu Lakota Oyate, regardless of the challenges we may face. His shared experiences with tribal citizens motivated him to serve and support our oyate. Knowing that we as Lakota people have the traditional, cultural, tribal, and educational knowledge, Lionel continued to advocate for Indigenous accreditation as being as valid as any other accrediting system in the U.S. Lionel’s vision had always been for a national tribal university in the Black Hills, where our tribal nations could bring our resources and knowledge together to educate our Indigenous citizens in our traditional homelands, where our creation story shares how we emerged to be doctors, lawyers, educators, and leaders—Lakota mind and voice. This vision incorporates kinship, land, and identity as Indigenous people.

Leadership is hard. You constantly face scrutiny and often don’t know if and when you have support. Through all of the challenges of leadership, Lionel remained strong in his mind and used his voice as an advocate of our Lakota knowledge systems. If you had attended a meeting or convening with Lionel, you would remember him saying, as Cheryl referenced earlier, “If it is to be, it is up to me,” thereby acknowledging his role as a leader to fulfill the vision of our ancestors and the founders of SGU. He also called upon each of us with those words to live up to and commit to achieving the goals that we set for ourselves and our communities.

In previous roles and while working for the College Fund, I had the opportunity to attend events hosted by SGU. Lionel always included our elders, spiritual leaders, educators, and community members to talk about the priorities and needs of our students and communities. He recalled and remembered the interactions with our Lakota citizens that impacted him and demonstrated the love he had for our Sicangu Lakota Oyate. In recent years, many of our relatives who would sing a Lakota song of strength had passed on, and knowing the importance of this song in our gatherings, Lionel began to share that song, making sure those prayers of strength were still present.

Through Lionel’s leadership and friendship, I came to know the hope he had in our younger Lakota relatives to carry on the vision of the SGU founders, and the trust in our Lakota wicohan (life ways) to do well for our relatives.

Cheryl Crazy Bull (Sicangu Lakota) is the president and CEO of the American Indian College Fund; Emily R. White Hat, JD (Sicangu Lakota), is the vice president of programs at the College Fund. Photo by Dennis Neumann