Working to Build Strong, Culturally Responsive Pathways for Rural Native Learners
Grant Partner Profile: American Indian College Fund
Both the College Fund and Ascendium believe that TCUs are vital hubs for social and economic development in rural and tribal areas. The College Fund will coordinate experts, including faculty and staff from TCUs and employers, who will work to develop intentional road maps to employment that connect to the rural and tribal communities they serve. Insights from this grant will help TCUs implement stronger career development plans at their institution and demonstrate how using learner outcome and labor market data can strengthen the road maps to employment that they create at their institution.
According to the American Indian College Fund, more than 90% of their scholarship recipients attending TCUs indicated they have a degree plan.
However, only 50% of respondents indicated they have met with someone at the institution to discuss their career plans.
Source: American Indian College Fund
Additionally, the College Fund will work to address the relative lack of employment data on Native learners in rural and tribal communities. They will do this by working with TCUs to develop key processes to supply that information to each other and to a national forum. TCUs will collaborate with local employers to consistently collect relevant data on their students’ employment outcomes. With this data in hand, TCUs can design more meaningful career support services and connect learners to good jobs in their communities.
Our Commitment
Ascendium is committed to learning about promising innovations, reforms, and solutions that connect rural Native American and Alaska Native learners from low-income backgrounds to postsecondary education and workforce training pathways that lead to good jobs. As part of this commitment, we support partnerships that center the cultural perspectives of rural Native learners and address the systemic barriers they face. Our investment in the American Indian College Fund will help us and others better understand how TCUs provide rural Native learners with services that reflect their cultural values and identities.
