“As tribal nations, we ultimately want to ensure our nations’ youth can access our ancestral-community knowledge and STEM training in supportive and innovative ways.”

— Sammy Matsaw, Shoshone-Bannock Fisheries research biologist and co-director of River Newe.

Cultivating Relationships (CR) is a multiyear learning process where K-12 teachers partner with Tribal Nations and University researchers to examine the relationships between people, place, lands, and waters.

 

CR teachers engage in land-based and on-line professional learning to design and apply curriculum that serves Indigenous students and ensures sustainable futures for all learners in K-12 classrooms.

Past research has shown STEM lessons ignore Indigenous principles that shaped thousands of years of sustainable land management practices. By centering Indigenous lessons and relationships with land in K-12 lesson planning, the project seeks to bridge the long-standing disconnect in American classrooms.