REPRINTED FROM Contemporary Education,

Vol.67, No.1, Fall 1995

Lac Court Oreilles Ojibwa Community College: The Little Northwoods School With a Giant Task

by David McGrath

I spent the winter of 1994 at the Lac Court Oreilles (lah-koo-duh-ray ') Ojibwa Indian Reservation in northwest Wisconsin, conducting research for our budding Native American studies program at College of DuPage in Illinois.

From the beginning, I was befuddled but intrigued, felt that here I had found a mythic country from which spring those dreams we have, in which the living commingle with the dead. My first morning there, a sunny but minus 20 degree Monday, I was invited to a "feast" to celebrate the Indian owned radio station's recent acquisition of new electronic equipment. Following a tour of WOJB's facilities, including hearing an explanation of the station's capacity to bounce its signal off satellites to reach listeners hundreds of miles in all directions, celebrants took part in a pipe ceremony in which Ojibwa holy man Archie (Nabagashki or "Night Sky") Mosay sent his own brand of signal in the form of tobacco spoke, wafting up to the spirits that they might listen to his words of thanks in the Ojibwa tongue. My light headedness from the smoke (my first cigarette in twenty years marked my participation in the rite) was intensified by the dizzying irony of what was happening, both sensations appropriate for the start of my mission. For with each new and colder morning, I was to confront another puzzle, another pair of truths juxtaposed but out of sync with this white man's linear thought processes.

Much of my research was conducted at the Indian-built Lac Court Oreilles Community College, which received accreditation in 1993, in its tenth year of serving the reservation, a community of 4,000, on 40,000 acres of woods and water in Sawyer County. I often fantasized about the puzzlement of members of the accreditation committee, especially during their tour and inspection of the college's west wing. Walking past, for example, the "Pipestone Mustache" auditorium, named after the revered late medicine man, they must have looked left to see a state of the art computer laboratory, where classes in math, science, English, and computer programing regularly met. Looking right, they would have seen the other "laboratory," a large room smelling of wood and pine tar, where students learn the ancient art of building canoes using birch bark.

Likewise, in the occupational arts building, they would have found a group of dozen or so Ojibwa men listening attentively to Instructor Robert Sanders as he demonstrated the process for building a footing with concrete; then leaving the building, passing through a small courtyard, and into another century, they would likely have witnessed a band of young men and women, learning how to fasten poles with basswood twine to make a wigwam. I imagined the acrobatic mental harmonics that committee members must have had to execute for their accreditation recommendation, in the face of the seemingly contradictory purposes at LCO: should this young college be placing more emphasis on training Indians1 for the modern world instead of engineering nostalgic recreations of the past?

Professor Marilyn Benton, head of Native American Studies at Lac Court Oreilles, put these images in focus. "Identity requires knowledge of the past," explained Benton. "So our mission at the college is to teach the traditional language and culture in order to restore the identity." Benton should know. Though her grandfather John Stone was an Ojibwa chief, Benton's only childhood recollection regarding him is of her mother keeping the children away from Stone, of demanding silence in his presence. Benton isn't sure whether her mother acted out of shame or out of a belief that she was protecting Indian tradition, but the result was that Benton grew up confused and insecure. It took considerable research for her to trace family roots and reclaim her identity, and she was edified to discover, long after her employment at LCO College, that her family had belonged to the totemic fish clan,2 whose numbers have historically been the tribe's teachers. She is now determined that her own grandchildren and the current generation of LCO students will know Ojibwa language and culture. She believes that only through a rebirth of the ancient culture will Indians develop self esteem and begin to solve the myriad of social problems that plague the reservations.

To this end LCO has instituted a full Native American studies program that includes history, philosophy, legal issues, literature, Indian arts, crafts and clothing, and Ojibwa language. Elders, who in native culture are accorded the respect of sagacious teachers, are frequent guest speakers at N.A. studies seminars, especially individuals skilled in native crafts and fluent in the Ojibwa tongue.

"There is a renaissance right now," Benton says. "Indian people are coming full circle, from assimilation and degradation to the upheaval of oppression through education.3 Twenty years ago there were no Indian resource people. Today there are Indian historians, educators, doctors, lawyers and congressmen. Our own tribal leader, Gaiashkibos (John Barber), is campaigning for congress right now."

Lac Court Oreilles Ojibwa Community College is one of twenty-eight reservation colleges nationwide that have assumed the dual role of preserving Native American language and culture while preparing its youth for success in a modern world. They see this function as vital in solving the problems of alcohol and drug abuse, gang violence, suicide, teen pregnancy, substandard health and housing, school dropouts, and unemployment.

At the Lac Court Oreilles Reservation, for example, the rate of alcoholism is over 40% and of alcohol abuse over 80% (one who "binges" for three days straight but practices moderation until his next paycheck is considered an abuser but not an alcoholic); and 29% of native deaths are alcohol related. While no definitive cause has been proven (medical scientists are skeptical of both an Indian congenital connection, and of the "short history" theory that holds Indians simply require a few hundred more years to learn to drink), generations of poverty and the psychosocial "coping" syndrome are the two strongest contenders.

LCO attacks this problem on two fronts. The first is to educate students to enter the field of health care, since rehabilitation and step programs for Native Americans seem to be effective only when administered by other native people.4 The second, less frontal assault is teaching Indian history and culture in order to empower students to find and then wear that all important badge of identity that Benton spoke of. The resultant enhanced sense of self worth will better arm the young Ojibwa for "coping" with life as the most severely oppressed American minority; and participation in pipe, drum, and medicine lodge ceremonies, the experiential component of the NA program, will enable them to rediscover their own spirituality, which in N.A. culture means more than a creed, as it involves an individual's connection to the universe, to earth's creation, and to other native people. Seeing elders who are already thus connected, and hearing the testimony of men and women positively transformed through this education process, are both very powerful lessons for the LCO student.

No better role model is offered through such programs at LCO than Ojibwa language professor Jerry Smith. I met him in the aforementioned "traditional laboratory" where he also teaches Ojibwa arts and crafts, such as birchbark canoe building and vessel making. Over six feet tall, very thin, always energized, Smith gives one the feeling of an electrically charged length of copper wire. His teaching clothes are bluejeans, hightop leather boots, and a blue flannel shirt; he uses a narrow leather strap to tie his black hair into a pony tail that trails down to his waist, and though his wide belt is accented by a heavy silver buckle, he conceals beneath his shirt the neck chain with the "Migis" shell that marks his membership in the Midewiwin, the clandestine society of healers and priests in the Ojibwa tribe.5

Smith is a hands-on educator who takes his students two or three times a month on field trips for practice of the traditional ways, such as spear fishing in the winter, ricing in summer, maple syrup making at Smith's "sugar bush" in the early spring, and participation in pipe ceremonies and celebratory feasts year round, at many of which Smith presides. But his most outstanding teaching function is as a traditional storyteller of the Ojibwa people, one who is specially gifted and annointed to tell stories of creation and of the tribe. He has committed to memory hundreds, perhaps thousands of stories which allegorically encapsulate Ojibwa religious beliefs and values, historical stories about Ojibwa settlement and the LCO reservation, stories used for the teaching of morals, and autobiographical stories. He relates these stories in the classroom and at tribal functions, executing probably his most important duty to establish tribal identification for the people at Lac Court Oreilles Reservation. He performs the duty with dramatic yet reverent tones, using his hands to draw pictures in the air for his listener, whether it be a picture of the winding road away from the spirit world, that the woman, who had not received a proper Indian burial, had to sadly traverse, or a picture of the size and spread of the antlers of a deer that had spoken to him in a dream.

I was enrolled in his Ojibwa Language I section, and though I confess to having made scant progress in mastering the explosive sounds and Latin-like syntax of the ancient tongue (most of the Indian words familiar in English, like pow-wow or toboggan, come from Ojibwa), I learned most of what I know of Ojibwa beliefs and about the LCO reservation from his stories. Students and, frequently, interested visitors from LCO and other reservations would arrive at 9 am to listen to and speak with this charismatic but humble man. Both his words and his example were provocative, his having conquered alcoholism ("I was a drunk for ten years," he said) to meet his obligation to his dead grandfather and to pursue the Ojibwa vocation of Mide and storyteller he received through a dream.

I recall one session that ran late on one of the warmer February mornings (-10) during which he told several stories to demonstrate the ritual and purpose of Ojibwa funeral rites. A young woman who had a question related to the recent death of a close relative, broke down in tears in the classroom. Calmly, intuitively, Smith asked her, "Did your aunt seem to know that death was coming?" After the student was able to recollect several manifestations of this truth, Smith assured her: "Well, in that deepest place in her heart, she was prepared. And now she is in a better place." The grateful, happy eyes of the student was a comfort to us all that morning.

Jerry Smith's method is neither magic nor psychology; it is speaking plainly what he knows as truth. This man, raised by his grandmother after his mother was going to give him up for adoption so that she could leave the reservation unfettered, had seen his share of untimely deaths of relatives and close friends taken by diabetes6 or alcohol or violent death. I found that his magnetism is not so much a product of his entertaining anecdotes, his recounting of mysterious visions and dreams, his tales of herbal cures by Mide's, or his portraits of colorful Manitou's (spirits). People flock to him, and you soon realize it's because there exists a kind of comfort zone surrounding him. It must be what it was like to be in the presence of St. Francis of Assisi, for Smith's absolute faith is free of arrogance; in fact, it's his obvious humility that is so refreshing. He leans forward to eagerly listen to what another has to say because, in spite of his many duties, he seems to have time for everyone. In fact, he believes he has a surplus of time, this life on earth being but a short prelude to his anticipated eternal life in the spirit world.

Jerry Smith's "no strings attached" smile was what drew me to him initially, as his was the first I encountered at Lac Court Oreilles, where civil though not necessarily courteous introductions to strangers was common, but certainly understandable. The reason for this guardedness is the sharp increase in outsiders' interest in Native Americans in the past few years. "Indians are a sexy topic these days," says Bill, a student who wrote for the LCO Literary Magazine. "A chimook [white person] wants to visit an 'exotic' people without much travel expense, have a religious experience, feel good about himself for caring about the Indians, and then get the hell out of here. He can go back home, where we're romanticized, not all up in his face like Blacks or Hispanics."

This feeling evinced by Bill and others shows another of the apparent contradictions not just at Lac Court Oreilles, but at many of the reservations: a minority with a mission to improve its lot seems to reject the solicitousness and good will of members of the majority. This paradox is justified by natives with a traditional story: the Indians and the whites are paddling down the same river in separate canoes, and if one occupant tries to climb into the other vessel, or to straddle the two vessels, one or both canoes will capsize. Truly, Indians are loath to trust outside interference, as centuries of regulation by white officials, who arrogantly stated they knew what was best for natives, had left them impoverished, uneducated, their numbers decimated, their culture eradicated. So Indians find tiresome the new wave of "wanna-be's," those individuals bored or disenchanted with their white religions, who want to sit in sweat lodges and dance in pow-wows in order to sate some quest for life's meaning, or to abate a temporary neurosis.

Considering this climate of wariness among reservations nation wide, Lac Court Oreilles Community College seems to go further than most in forging cooperative relationships with outside individuals and institutions, and in perceiving itself as a member school of the nation of community colleges, not just of the 28 native schools. At least a fourth of its students enrolled are non natives from throughout Sawyer County. It has begun summer institutes for teachers throughout the state of Wisconsin interested in Native American culture. LCO has recently signed an articulation agreement with the University of Wisconsin in Eau Claire. And it tries to accommodate reasonable requests from other educational institutions that wish to take advantage of LCO's cultural resources--native American studies center, elders as consultants, and Native American Departmental Staff.

One recent example is LCO's collaboration with College of DuPage in 1994 to produce a literary magazine featuring the prose, poetry and visual art of native Americans. In the context of the Indian parable, the Ojibwa canoe paddles down the Chippewa River along side the canoes of whites from Hayward and Bayfield, Wisconsin; from Duluth-Superior, and from Eau Claire. LCO does all it can to fulfill its role and responsibility as a true community college, taking its lead from Chairman Gaiashkibos, who sees the practical need to cooperate with white businesses and citizens in the county. In spite of the desire of his people to preserve its culture, he also realizes they cannot function in isolation, especially since so many of their progressive plans depend on the success of their newly opened casino, whose major clientele is comprised of white tourists from Wisconsin, Illinois and Minnesota. The result is that the Lac Court Oreilles Ojibwa are unique in the felicitous relationship it enjoys with its neighbors, that has enabled it to avoid the painful clashes with whites such as that which the Lac Du Flambeau Ojibwa, a hundred miles east, have over spearfishing treaty rights each spring.

Finally, what magic does LCO use to resolve the ultimate conflict: the sharp need to safeguard the purity of its culture, in spite of the inescapable necessity of coexistence with white society? Perhaps in the example of Professor Jerry Smith lies the answer. One morning after the students successfully turned the language lesson into another story session, Smith rose and closed the door of the classroom, then proceeded with a story about the origins of the sweat lodge. After class when I asked him about the door, he replied, "Someone may think I am telling sacred stories to outsiders. But I trust you, and as a teacher you will help to change attitudes about Indian people." So LCO College must perform a balancing act by keeping intact the sacred customs and language, while keeping outsiders apprised of their purpose and method. For there is grave concern at LCO about "attitudes," about stereotypical perceptions of Ojibwa and other Native Americans.

Towards the end of the winter term, I was asked by a native student named White Buck what I had learned during my stay at LCO. When I told him that I've grown to envy the way Indians face each day, that is, the way they savor each moment, exulting in nature and in each other, rather than rushing headlong to compete in a daily race of acquisition, he nodded vigorously, and said almost pleadingly: "I'm so glad. So many white people see that and think we're just lazy."

A painful demonstration of this need for attitudes to change was the aforementioned 5 year conflict involving spear fishing rights and the Lac Du Flambeau Reservation. It ended, for the time being, on February 6, 1994 in court, with the judge declaring white protesters guilty of racial hate crimes, barring them from the boat landings in the future, and fining them $200,000. The hate crimes were a consequence of non-native ignorance of the culture, history and nature of the Ojibwa and of their deep religious need to spearfish in spring, in accordance with provisions of the 1854 treaty--ignorance that had local Wisconsin residents shouting "timber niggers" while throwing rocks at the fishing boats, for what they errantly perceived as Ojibwa greed. Little Lac Court Oreilles Ojibwa Community College, whose largest semester enrollment thus far has been 400 pupils, finds itself charged with the task of "changing attitudes," of eliminating the ignorance that fomented the Lac Du Flambeau strife, with teaching and preserving the language, with resurrecting and safeguarding the culture, and with preparing its youth to be prosperous in a technological world.

Is that an impossible assignment for the Indian-built school in the north woods? For an answer one may do well to ask "Bluejay," a student of LCO College. Nineteen years old, with long, flowing black hair and a wide, infectious smile, Jay Staros could be mistaken for a rock musician with his dangling turquoise earring and silver choker necklace. But less than a year ago, Staros was arrested for the third time by Minneapolis police, this time for "disorderly conduct," or, as Jay explains, for hanging with the wrong crowd. From Minneapolis he was extradited to Pine Ridge because of an outstanding warrant, and after jail time there was expelled from his home by his mother who had had her fill of his trouble. Staros made his way to Wisconsin and to Lac Court Oreilles where he had an aunt who offered him a home, provided he enroll in LCO College. That, says Jay, was the turning point in his young life:

"I used to be at the Turtle Lake Casino, run with the wrong people. I was ashamed of other Indians, the way they dressed and what people thought about them." But now Jay is an avid student of Indian history, culture, and of Ojibwa language. He is a "messenger" in the medicine lodge, a regular participant in feasts and ceremonies throughout Ojibwa territory, and a "teasing" favorite of the elders. His outspokenness, affability and sense of humor have won him frequent invitations to guest host an Indian news and music program on radio station WOJB, where he has fast become known as "Bluejay" of the Tuesday evening show "Drum Song."

Not every juvenile delinquent can be guaranteed similar transformation by registering at LCO Ojibwa Community College; but every Native American youth deserves the infusion of knowledge, pride, and self esteem that a community college like LCO can give.

Notes

1. The term "Indians" is used with frequency by Ojibwa professors, elders, and political leaders, among others. Regarding the merit of "Native Americans" as the more politically correct term, one male Ojibwa told me: "I am no more Native American than I am Indian" (his referring to the European roots of America).

2. Ojibwa families were divided into five major clans, each identified with a a particular animal spirit and tribal function. Historians believe that the primary purpose of clan divisions was to prevent accidental incestuous relationships, as an Ojibwa could not marry within his or her clan.

3. A U.S. Government program (circa 1930) of assimilation carried out through Bureau of Indian Affairs Schools conscripted children and forbade and punished the use of native language and customs.

4. The U.S. government is finding, in fact, that native administration of all social programs is more productive, not surprising in view of centuries of neglect or, at best, abusive patronization by white bureaucrats leading to a formidable barrier of mistrust.

5. Migis is the native term for a kind of seashell representative of the religious icon of Ojibwa mythology that led the people's migration from the Atlantic Coast to the Great Lakes. 6. Native Americans have the highest incidence of diabetes of all ethnic groups in America. The reason is uncertain, although speculation about diet and genetics is ongoing (one theory is that a gene enabled Indians to survive harsh winters by slowing down metabolism, thus slowing down sugar deconstruction in the body).