ga-du-giINVESTING IN YOUTH 2013 PHOTO CREDIT: HEATHER JAMES herokee Preservation Foundation works to preserve our native culture, enhance our natural environ- Cment and create appropriate and diverse economic opportunities – in order to improve the quality of life for the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians (EBCI) and strengthen Western North Carolina. rough the investment in the Foundation made possible by Page 2 GROWING INTO LEADERS e Cherokee Youth the Tribal Gaming Compact, tribal members, EBCI organiza- Council has become a model for other youth organizations tions and partners have been a vital part of the Cherokee Preser- in the region. vation Foundation’s impact on cultural preservation, economic Page 6 PASSING THE TORCH – e Snowbird and Big Cove sum- development and environmental preservation eorts. mer camps are teaching Cherokee youth to speak their native Since 2002, the Foundation has made 783 grants valued at language, and putting them in a position to teach it to others. more than $61 million. is sum, combined with matching Page 10 TRAVELLING THROUGH TIME e Cherokee Trails grants and resources provided by other organizations, has cre- program is changing how Cherokee history, culture and ated a benet to our communities worth over $150 million. geography can be taught. In the 2013 ga-du-gi report to our community, we focus on Page 14 REVERSING OUR YOUTH MIGRATION An entrepreneur- some of the investments the Foundation has made in youth ship curriculum will be be implemented at schools to give on the Qualla Boundary and in the surrounding region. In young people a means to stay and prosper in our region. total, our youth investments are valued at more than $9.25 million. We hope you will enjoy these stories: 1 GROWING into Leaders Cherokee Youth Council members learn about traditional gardening methods at Kituwah Mound. SKY KANOTT hen Hannah Ledford rst joined the Cherokee Youth Council two years ago at age 13, she Wnever said a word in a Youth Council meeting. But the minute the meeting was over, she would approach Sky Kanott, the Cherokee Youth Council Coordinator, and all sorts of wonder- ful ideas poured out of her. Two years and dozens of experiences later, Hannah has opened up. She freely shares her ideas with the other 40 members of the Youth Council – and she works hard to build support for those concepts because everyone in the group has to want to do something before the Youth Council will take it up. Her experience is one of many remarkable stories of Cherokee Youth Council members growing up both quickly and well. 2 e Cherokee Youth Council was estab- e Youth Council’s activities are wide- Hannah Ledford lished in 2007 to bring back the valued ranging and extensive. Recently, for ex- and Simon Monte- voice of youth that was the tradition in the ample, EBCI members Dakota Brown, longo are among the days of the Cherokee Grand Council and Kevin Jackson and Tim Swayney, have 40 Cherokee Youth enable youth to serve their community and been teaching the youth traditional dances Council members develop leadership skills. In 2011, Youth and stomps, and lessons are followed by whose communica- Council members established the Seven conversations about Cherokee culture. tion and leadership skills have grown by Clans Grant Council (SCGS), which ac- Many of the youth’s eorts focus on the leaps and bounds, cepts youth-written grant applications for promotion of healthy lifestyles. One major according to Sky youth-led projects on the Qualla Bound- initiative is the Seven Clans Grant Council, Kanott (center), ary. Sky Kanott, just three years removed which makes grants up to $2,000 dollars, the Youth Council from college herself, says the maturation of with priority given to youth-led projects Coordinator. the Youth Council members “is just crazy on the Qualla Boundary that address drug to see.” “Twelve to eighteen-year olds are learn- ing how to make grants, which requires understanding budgets and a lot of other things,” she said. “And all their Youth Council activities require being able to develop consensus for their ideas and public speaking, both at Tribal Council and at national conferences such as United National Indian Tribal Youth (UNITY). Each young man and woman has changed tremendously through their involvement in the Youth Council and their leadership skills have become awesome. ey are growing in every way possible.” Before the Cherokee Youth Council was created, young people on the Qualla Boundary longed for the means to come together with other youth who wanted to have fun and opportunities to be part of their community. Cherokee Preserva- tion Foundation developed the concept for the Cherokee Youth Council, in part to address the needs of Cherokee youth, but also to help the EBCI develop the leadership skills of its future leaders. e Foundation provided initial funding and has given nancial and other support ever since, and the EBCI Cooperative Exten- OCUMMA O sion Program has provided supervisory RENDA support and space for the Youth Council. B 3 what makes the accomplishment even more noteworthy is that Simon is 15 and most of the national board members are 18. After Youth Council members connected at UNITY with Chief Swag (a.k.a. Jef- frey Duarte) a hip-hop artist and advocate for a drug- and alcohol-free lifestyle, they invited him to Cherokee in the past year to present a free concert to local youth, and 300 attended. e concert could be free because Youth Council members had con- ducted silent auctions and other fundrais- ing activities to pay for him to come. ANOTT K Now the Youth Council members have KY S come up with their biggest healthy lifestyle Chief Swag (a.k.a. and alcohol addiction, suicide, disease and idea so far. ey want to start a local gro- Jeffrey Duarte), a illness, abuse, poverty and homelessness. cery store that will provide locally grown hip-hop artist and Before the SCGC could begin making meat and produce to tribal members who advocate for a drug- grants, the youth had to create a grant have diabetes. e concept is so important and alcohol-free application process that includes funding to them that they have gone through an lifestyle, presented guidelines, grant selection methods, grant Indianpreneurship class at the Sequoyah a free local concert monitoring policies and grant evaluation Fund to prepare them to develop a after the Cherokee measurements. business plan. Youth Council raised e Cherokee Youth Council has also Hannah Ledford is excited to be learning funds to bring him to facilitated a community conversation about how to run a business. “e grocery Cherokee. about teen pregnancy by creating a video store idea is helping a lot of members see on the topic, recruiting members, friends how we could start businesses after col- and family members to give their testimo- lege,” she said. “It gives us a really good nies about the impact of teen pregnancy career option.” on their lives. Youth Council members In its early years, the Cherokee Youth Right: e Chero- learned how to work behind and in Council put most of its energy into its Go kee Youth Council front of a camera, and then they Green Team, which expanded recycling created a uniquely learned how to excel in front of on the Qualla Boundary and made a Cherokee spin on re- a big crowd, presenting their big dierence through community cycling by putting the lm to approximately education, getting 1,000 recy-recy traditional Cherokee 1,000 native youth at cling bins into EBCI govern-govern symbol that means the UNITY conference. ment buildings and 2,000 “endless” on recycling Simon Montelongo was reusable shopping bags out into bins and reusable elected to represent the the community. e traditional shopping bags. Southeast Area Caucus at the Cherokee symbol meaning “endless” 2012 UNITY conference, making that the Go Green Team put on the him the rst EBCI member to serve recycling bins and the reusable bags put a on UNITY’s national board. Kanott says uniquely Cherokee spin on the eort. 4 Youth in Haywood, Jackson, Swain, Clay, the councils plan to undertake a joint Macon, Graham, Clay and Cherokee project that addresses an important counties have paid close attention to the regional issue. Cherokee Youth Council, and today, each “e youth came together to network at of these counties has its own youth coun- the Summit, and each council wore a dif- cil, with support from Cherokee Preserva- ferent color of t-shirt,” Kanott said. “At tion Foundation and county-based orga- rst, the kids clustered with kids from their nizations such as 4-H. All of them focus own council, but before long, colors were at least partially on environmental sustain- mixed throughout the room and you could ability projects. tell everyone was making new friends. Eight youth councils In November, members of the Cherokee Youth from the newer councils told the came together at a Youth Council and the seven county Youth Cherokee kids they admire how we’ve built recent Regional Youth Councils came together at the fourth an- our program around our culture. ey Council Summit, with nual Regional Youth Council Summit at asked us how we’ve been able to get to participants wearing Fontana Village Resort. e sixty youth where we are today, and as we told them, dedicated the Summit to the ght against the members of the Cherokee Youth t-shirts in different bullying, honoring the late Damien Heater Council are a family.” colors to demonstrate where they live. of Macon County. In the coming months, A really cool family.