HPAIRI's Next Steps

“I fought to keep our land, our water and our hunting grounds – today, education is the weapon my people need to protect them.” – Chief Washakie

James Trosper - being interviewed by World Wisdom

The Shoshone Chief’s prophecy serves as a reminder of the power education can bring to a people. Beginning this summer, Native American students and the High Plains American Indian Research Institute, HPAIRI, will have a physical home at the University of Wyoming in an American Indian center, which will bring new life to the Chief’s words. Laramie will again be home to a place that honors the Native American tradition through research, culture, and learning as the land on which the center sits once belonged to the Northern Arapahoe.  The center and HPAIRI will be led by Washakie’s great-great grandson, James Trosper, who takes the reins from tireless advocate Judy Antell. Antell leaves the University of Wyoming three years after coming out of retirement to serve as HPAIRI’s first director. She is an enrolled member of the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe, White Earth Reservation, and the founding director of the American Indian Studies program.

Under Antell’s guidance, HPAIRI established a reciprocal relationship between the Northern Arapaho and Eastern Shoshone people, of the Wind River Reservation, and the University of Wyoming. This relationship enabled the exchange of information and ideas and today the Institute serves as an information clearinghouse and as a facilitator for researchers wishing to work on the reservation. It maintains a catalog of resources and information on research completed on the Wind River Reservation, and provides a campus voice for the tribes’ interests. Wyoming EPSCoR became involved with HPAIRI in 2012 through funding the creation of a web-based inventory of UW research conducted with tribal communities and co-funding the establishment of a gathering place on campus for Native students.

Trosper’s involvement with HPAIRI and the new Native American center spans 20 years and was sparked by the energy, conversation, and ideas generated at the Indian Education Office on campus. That involvement also allowed him to appreciate the power of and advocate for student voice in the formation of a center. Meetings with college students and young people on the reservation allowed Trosper to hear students’ hopes fears and aspirations for the future. These meetings guided the vision for a center on campus. He knew it needed to be a community space that would help ease the transition to college for Native students who often feel isolated in the more individualistic university setting.

Sitting around a table with these two is something special; it is a lesson and gift. They share aspirations for the program, invite the listener into their vision, and speak of the future warmly and with affection. Listening to their mutual respect is unique. Upon inheriting the role of directorship from Antell, Trosper explained the value and wisdom elders can contribute to a program as a gift to the future. He intends to continue to honor Antell and her vision for HPAIRI as it develops a physical presence on campus. In addition he will infuse some of his own detail in the larger picture. Today there is a center; it is a home on campus from which to build community. There is a kitchen table around which students can share a meal and conversation. It is the coming together of people, fellowship, and stories that knit a community and that we hope will allow the University and HPAIRI to honor Chief Washakie’s words.