The American Indian Center held a New Year Celebration this Sept. 9 to celebrate the new year and to culturally acknowledge the Minnesota tribal nation flags coming to campus.
The event also unveiled and celebrated the new AIC mural designed by artists Sarah Agaton Howes and Holly Young that decorates the American Indian Center, 219 Atwood Memorial Center. St. Cloud State resides on the traditional homelands of the Dakota and the ancestral lands of the Anishinaabe. The College of Education and Learning Design also announced a $1.56 million federal scholarship program that will support training of native teachers and grow and indiginize the teacher education programs at St. Cloud State University.
Fond du Lac tribal leaders, veterans and drummers were in attendance to help celebrate the tribal nation flags coming to campus.
The new mural, designed jointly by an Anishinaabe artist and a Dakota artist, highlights the relationship of peace and sharing between the Anishinaabe and Dakota in Minnesota and fact indigenous beliefs center women as the centers of power.
St. Cloud State serves 148 indigenous students, and student leaders from the All Tribes Council spoke at the event to talk about what the mural means to them. They spoke about how the mural makes them feel finally represented on campus and shows that the university is invested in the American Indian Center after its move into the Atwood Memorial Center last year.
Everyone is invited to come to the American Indian Center in Atwood to see the new mural.
