Still Forgotten?

The plight of American Indian communities, to average Americans, is usually either relegated to some distant past or outright ignored. If you're educated, maybe you'll remember reading about the Trail of Tears, or Wounded Knee (probably not Pine Ridge though).

But what about indigenous peoples today? They're largely broken, exiled to barren reservations, faced with an indifferent - or hostile - government, and casino-corrupted leaders.

This makes it all the more important that we sit up and take notice when they rise up and assert their collective rights, despite an almost total media blackout.

The stage is D-Q University, California's only Native College, and the only one of its kind outside a reservation. It is a two-year school, founded in 1971 as a direct result of native and chican@ student and community organizing, agitation, and militant action (the former military base which is now D-Q's campus was originally going to become a branch UC school and animal testing lab). In 1977 it received official accreditation.

Due to a number of factors, which community leaders generally attribute to corrupt and incompetent Trustees, the school lost its accreditation in 2005. Then ensued a legal battle between two separate Boards of Trustees claiming legitimacy. Since then the fight has been between the victorious Board and the students, faculty, and community members who want to see D-Q continue.

Students and activists have been occupying the university on and off since the summer it was finally "closed," 2006. They have faced brutal police repression, threats, a lack of resources, and public indifference, but they still remain at D-Q, holding classes of their own. Sadly there is very little information about what's going on campus right now. These are the latest items I was able to find:

Police Raid D-Q University: Eighteen Students, Elders and Supporters Arrested
http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2008/03/31/18489787.php

Charges from March 31st Arrests at D-Q University Are Dropped
http://publish.indymedia.org/en/2008/04/904890.shtml

"Students and collaborators continued to resist the closure of D-Q University, the only tribal college in California and the only indigenous-controlled institution of higher learning outside of a reservation in the United States."
http://www.dominionpaper.ca/articles/1969

Native American Students at D-Q University Struggle to Save Student Representation
http://publish.indymedia.org/en/2007/06/888161.shtml