Wakaneja Ta Wolakota: Mentoring Youth Through the Lakota Way of Life

Friends of the Children–He Sapa’s mission is to impact generational change by empowering youth who are facing the greatest obstacles through relationships with professional mentors–12+ years, no matter what. Friends-He Sapa is part of a national network with a 30-year track record of breaking cycles of poverty and trauma. We annually enroll 32 high-risk Native American youth and currently serve 185 Native Americans in Rapid City and Pine Ridge Indian Reservation (Wazi Ahanhan Oyanke). Founded to combat poverty, trauma, and isolation in these communities, the urgent need for mental health services was evident in 2020 when 177 suicide attempts and 168 threats prompted a tribal state of emergency. 

Our goal is to create healing for our land, community, and for the children we serve by strengthening and restoring the inherent connection we have to our culture. When we reconnect with our language and culture, we can begin to heal generational and cultural trauma, particularly for our children. Children who feel connected to their culture and heritage have a greater sense of identity, feel proud of who they are, and experience more belonging in their community.  

Indigenous people, including the Lakota Oyate, have made this place home for many thousands of years, and our language derived from our relationship with the land, each other, and the many other beings that live here. Preserving and passing on the Lakota language is valuable in itself, and the language also offers a path into Lakota lifeways, knowledge and ways of understanding and interacting with the world. Humanities programming taught by respected Indigenous elders can help foster understanding and conversations among people across the state. 

Our evidence-based professional mentoring model has 6 distinguishing elements: 1.) We intentionally identify and serve Native children facing the greatest risk factors. 2.) We employ full-time, highly trained Native-identifying professional mentors (“Relatives”) with skills and knowledge to work with children and families with histories of personal and cultural trauma. Mentors commit 3 to 4 hours per week with each child, including 2 hours in school. 3.) We serve youth from ages 4 to 6 years old, providing a 12-year commitment no matter what. 4.) Our commitment includes all facets of a child’s life from home, school, and community. We are grounded in Lakota culture to provide holistic, wrap-around services to the children and their families including cultural interventions that support trauma healing. 5.) We develop trusting relationships with caregivers/elders so we can foster family well-being. 6). Our professional mentoring model is backed by 30 years of evidence and results and further strengthened by our deep attachment to Lakota traditions and expertise in educating and serving Native American children and families. 

Research shows that the most important strategies for buffering the long-term effects of trauma on children are consistent, caring relationships with adults, and teaching core capabilities such as self-regulation. Our model provides both. Of the three to four hours that Relatives spend one-on-one with each youth weekly, two hours are in school, helping with academics and social-emotional growth and assuring that youth get the services they need. Relatives’ school time with children focuses on attendance, engagement, social-emotional learning, and school achievement. Our highly individualized program allows Relatives to assist in whatever ways each child needs. Relatives help in the classroom, and they also help youth navigate peer relationships on the playground, deal with social anxiety at lunch, and learn to successfully navigate transitions.     

Outside of school, Relatives intentionally design fun and enriching activities for indigenous youth. Our program practices are grounded in Lakota culture and ways of knowing and being. Through the guidance of our cultural advisor, Rick Two Dogs, is guiding this work through the extended kinship model through naming ceremonies, making of relatives, coming-of-age ceremonies, healing camps, and other sacred traditions. Our teachings are guided by the Lakota values of respect, honor, courage, fortitude, generosity, and humility.

By grounding programming in Lakota ways of knowing and being, we are ensuring the broken Buffalo Circles that have surrounded and protected the Wakanyeja since time immemorial are repaired as the Wakanyeja navigate a Western world that was not designed to serve them. Together, Friends of the Children – He Sapa and the Lakota people are transforming families and communities through the reconstituting of extended kinship systems, creating a regenerative framework for empowerment and healing that can be adapted by other Indigenous peoples across the country.

Friends of the Children - He Sapa benefits the urban Indian community of Rapid City and the reservation districts of Manderson, Porcupine, Wounded Knee, Rockyford, and Kyle on the Oglala Lakota Nation. 

The strengths of Native communities, such as the importance of kinship and ancestry; history, language, and traditional practices; the value of community; and Tribal sovereignty, often go unrecognized by systems and social service organizations, which contributes to vast racial disparities in long-term educational, health, and social outcomes. In contrast, we are implementing the Friends of the Children’s model through a traditional, Indigenous relational worldview to restore balance and harmony in the lives of Native children and families and support them to awaken their inherent resilience. By embedding our paid, professional mentors into existing service continuums, we challenge systems to think beyond short-term, transactional approaches to achieve improved long-term, sustainable results for children and families. This, in turn, will create ripples of resilience that will radiate outward, through extended kinship systems, and entire communities. 

Friends of the Children’s proven ability to help families stay together and mitigate the negative impacts of the trauma and instability caused by family separations makes our work in Indian Country more important than ever. As a result of this work, we will see an increase in high school/GED completion for indigenous youth, fewer referrals to the juvenile justice system, avoiding early parenting, our model will also increase the cultural identity of the indigenous youth and families we serve., In addition, we will see a reduction in the number of Native youth entering the foster care system, fewer experiences of trauma among Native youth and caregivers that result from a child being removed from their home and the care of their relatives, and an increase in personal, familial, and communal resilience, particularly strengthening Lakota kinship systems. 

Friends of the Children – He Sapa’s has a diverse Board of Directors that is representative of the youth and families we serve in our communities:

• Lila Demaris Mehlhaff - Board Chair, Enrolled member of the Standing Rock Sioux, Human Services Coordinator, Office of the Mayor in Rapid City 
• Gene Tyon - Vice Board Chair, Enrolled member of Oglala Sioux Tribe, Executive Director, Oaye Luta Okolakiciye (Moving Forward in a Sacred Way)  
• Alicia Mousseau, PhD - Board Member, Enrolled member of the Oglala Sioux Tribe, Vice President, Oglala Sioux Tribe
• Tim Doyle - Board Member, Lieutenant, Rapid City Police Department 
• Tasha Mousseau - Board Member, Enrolled member of the Wichita and Affiliated Tribes and is Kiowa, Caddo, and Hunka Oglala Lakota, National Director of Tribal Programs, Friends of the Children 
• Mike Franke - Board Member, Assistant Store Leader, Scheels 

Our staff have lived experiences that lend to this needed work helping indigenous youth thrive: 

• Trivia Afraid of Lightning-Craddock, Program Director, is an enrolled member of the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe Miniconju Band of the Lakota. She has a B.A. in Literature and Communications and a master’s degree in leadership and management. Currently, she is pursuing a Ph.D. in Health Sciences. Trivia’s experience in public health with suicide intervention, prevention, substance abuse, and academic research. Her background includes evaluation and quality improvement of public health programs, community programs, and case management. Further, in 2020 she co-authored “Healing Within Smoking Cessation Intervention for American Indian Women with the Black Hills Center for American Indian Health”. 

• Aimee Pond, Director of Programs & Partnerships, is an enrolled Oglala Lakota tribal member who studied Social Work at the University of Wyoming. She worked for Laramie Head Start and later became the Youth Leadership Development Initiative Director at Thunder Valley CDC. She has implemented the Reconnecting Youth program, a substance abuse and drop-out prevention curriculum, in high school classes.  Aimee works with families to develop goals and advocate for themselves by connecting them to services and resources. She also builds and maintains relationships with community partners, collaborating with other organizations to extend the local continuum of care.  

• Richard "Hmuya Mani" Two Dogs, Cultural Advisor, is an enrolled member of the Oglala Sioux Tribe and guides our work to provide ceremonial modalities of healing to assist individuals recovering from trauma. This includes reconstituting Lakota kinship systems through naming ceremonies, making of relatives, coming-of-age ceremonies, and healing camps. For more than three decades, Mr. Two Dogs has provided Lakota cultural services to many tribal nations in the United States and Canada. He has extensive experience in development and training in the areas of Lakota mental health and wellness, Lakota language revitalization, cultural competency, child and family development, and individual/family healing. Mr. Two Dogs helps educate, advocate, and guide Friends-He Sapa to ensure children and families receive appropriate culturally responsive services associated with the program.  

Friends of the Children has been in existence for over 30 years, starting in Portland, OR. There are over 34+ chapters across the nation, with Friends of the Children - He Sapa being the first culturally specific chapter. We have two distinct locations; our headquarters is in He Sapa (Rapid City) and our other site is located on the Pine Ridge Reservation –the Oglala Lakota Nation. Together with partner agencies in He Sapa and the Oglala Lakota Nation, Friends–He Sapa has 47 youth and families enrolled in our program at both sites. We are finalizing enrollment for this year, for a total of 64 youth served at Friend of the Children - He Sapa at the end of May. We expect to enroll new cohorts of youth each year moving forward.

I am applying to Solve to have the opportunity to participate in capacity-building workshops and leadership coaching. MIT Solve offers much-needed support and networking that would benefit our indigenous-led nonprofit at Friends of the Children - He Sapa. Our hope is to be connected to MIT Solve for future opportunities to engage the youth and families that we serve. Although our youth are only ages 4-6 years old right now, we want them to have access to opportunities beyond our community, for youth to dream big, as big as MIT.

Valeriah Big Eagle, Wakan Wocekiye Win (Sacred Prayer Woman), who is an enrolled member of the Ihanktonwan Oyate, serves as the inaugural Executive Director. Valeriah is a 2020 Bush Fellow and has strong ties to both the Rapid City and Pine Ridge communities. She received both her Baccalaureate in Sociology and her Master of Education from South Dakota State University. In addition, she received her Doctor of Education in Education Leadership from the University of South Dakota, specializing in Adult and Higher Education Administration. Valeriah serves as an indigenous education advocate for Rapid City Area Schools Title VI Indian Education and co-facilitated the district’s Indigenous Education Task Force which prompted the creation of a Lakota immersion program. She currently serves on the boards of He Sapa Otipi: Community Center for People of the Black Hills; is chair of Oaye Luta Okolakiciye (Moving Forward in a Sacred Way); is co-founder and coach of He Sapa All-Nations Basketball; and is a member of the South Dakota Education Equity Coalition, among her numerous other volunteer roles. She understands the inequitable challenges that Indigenous students face in education systems due to a lack of cultural understanding and systemic racism, especially if they are in settings with little support for their cultural identity. She studied healing-informed practices in education that support Indigenous students and hopes to influence programming and public policy initiatives to culturally support Indigenous students, increasing Native American students to graduate from high school, college, and beyond. Some of her accomplishments include being selected for Prairie Business Magazine’s “40 Under 40” Award, the F.O. Butler in Excellence for Community Service Award, and for serving as a 2020 Bush Fellow. She also participated in various leadership programs including Leadership South Dakota, Native Nation Rebuilders, Rapid City Collective Impact Emerging Leaders, and Leadership Rapid City.

Friends - He Sapa currently serves 47 Indigenous youth and families in Rapid City and Oglala Lakota Nation. The children enrolled in our program are ages 4 - 8 and all identify as Indigenous; we also provide direct support to their parents, caregivers, and other family members, reaching 249 individuals. By May 2025, we will have 96 youth and their families enrolled in our program, impacting over 557 individuals across both communities.  The youth we serve are impacted the most by systemic disinvestment and barriers, including those experiencing chronic poverty, complex trauma, and at risk of isolation and disconnection. Generational trauma, forced assimilation, and cultural genocide have led to a high prevalence of opioid and other substance misuse, mental health challenges, low life expectancy rates, and involvement in the criminal justice systems among Indigenous children and families. The need for mental health services at Oglala Lakota Nation was clear in 2020, with 177 suicide ideations and 168 threats reported during the calendar year among the total population of 18,850. This unfortunate situation led to a declaration of a tribal state of emergency, which is still in effect today. Friends-He Sapa is uniquely equipped to address the critical issue of mental health challenges among Indigenous youth in Rapid City and the Oglala Lakota Nation, drawing upon our extensive experience in this field. Our approach is deeply rooted in Lakota cultural values and traditions, recognizing the importance of developing strength-based skills and resilience using an innovative approach that combines cultural interventions and evidence-based strategies to build protective factors among Indigenous youth. By leveraging culturally responsive strategies, Friends-He Sapa aims to mitigate ACEs and trauma that contribute to risk factors associated with substance misuse while promoting emotional well-being, self-efficacy, and cultural connectedness. Through this transformative cultural approach, the organization not only addresses immediate challenges but also fosters long-term positive outcomes for children and families, setting a new standard for service delivery in Indigenous communities. 

Friends-He Sapa guides indigenous youth through program targets focused on Core Asset development in nine skill areas (growth mindset, positive relationship building, finding your spark, problem-solving, self-determination, self-management, perseverance/grit, hope, and belonging) and Roadmap Goal achievement in five intermediate outcome areas (School Success, Prosocial Development, Making Good Choices, Connectedness to Cultural Identity, Plans and Skills for the Future, and Improved Health). Our weekly service delivery at home, school, and in the community includes wraparound support that contextualizes the application of social-emotional skills effective for healing trauma, fostering resilience, and creating pathways to long-term success. Our primary objective is to provide consistent, caring, relationship-based programming to reduce risk factors and strengthen protective factors among youth, ensuring long-term well-being and positive outcomes in all areas of life including health, education, and economic mobility. Through partnerships, individualized goal-setting, and family engagement, our program tailors its approach to addressing specific risk factors and needs, enhancing its effectiveness. Each year, we enroll 32 youth annually, with 16 in Rapid City and 16 in Oglala Lakota Nation, engaging them in cultural interventions and support services. These enrollment targets ensure our high-impact, evidence-based approach can meet the demand for our services in each community, maximizing the program’s impact on the local opioid misuse prevention strategy. Additionally, by incorporating 2Gen programming to support caregivers and connecting families to stabilizing resources, our program fosters a supportive environment conducive to prevention efforts.

Our evidence-based programming model has 6 distinguishing elements: 

1. We intentionally serve children facing the greatest risk factors.
2. We hire full-time, highly trained professional mentors (called “Relatives”) with skills and knowledge to work with children and families with personal and cultural trauma histories, spending 3 to 4 hours each week with each child, including 2 hours in school.
3. We start working with children at ages 4-6 and commit to them through high school graduation.
4. We are involved in all facets of a child’s life (school, home, and community) and grounded in Lakota culture to provide holistic, wrap-around services.
5. Friends develop trusting relationships with caregivers, relatives, and elders, partnering to promote the child’s learning and development 
6. We combine our national network’s 30 years of proven results with our leadership’s deep attachment to Lakota traditions and spirituality and their expertise in serving Indigenous youth and families.

Our long-term proven outcomes are to help youth: 

• Graduate high school or obtain their GED.
• Remain free of the juvenile justice system.
• Avoid early parenting.
• Enroll in post-secondary education, serve our country, or enter the workforce.

To measure our progress toward the broader protective factors contributing to working with youth, we will utilize the following developmentally- and age-appropriate indicators: 

• School Success (≥90%): Evaluate indicators such as regular school attendance, completion of homework, and sustained focus in class to ensure progress in academic success. 
• Prosocial Development (≥95%): Assess healthy coping mechanisms for stress, effective communication skills, and positive relationships with peers and adults to ensure progress in prosocial development. 
• Making Good Choices (≥90%): Taking part in positive extracurricular activities, avoiding risky behaviors, and choosing non-aggressive behavior during conflict.
• Connectedness to Cultural Identity (≥90%): Taking part in Lakota culture and Indigenous ways of knowing and being.
• Plans and Skills for the Future (≥85%): Track goal-setting and achievement, as well as planning for special activities to ensure progress in preparing for the future. 
• Core Assets Development (≥90%): Ensuring progress in developing a minimum of 7 out of 9 Core Assets, fortifying their resilience against risk factors. 
• Caregiver Engagement (≥85%): Foster strong partnerships with caregivers measured by at least four monthly interactions between caregivers and Friends. 

Through our evidence-based 2Gen model, Relatives support caregivers—many of whom have also experienced trauma—by connecting them to community resources to help them meet their goals for financial well-being, housing, career development, and parenting. A Relative’s relationship with families allows them to work on strengths to advocate for themselves and articulate their needs and challenges, amplifying the medical system’s work to prevent and treat. We work closely with our community and tribal partners to remove barriers that prevent them from accessing resources. Our goal is to break harmful cycles, empower families to create positive change and promote health, well-being, and community. These services are successful when we achieve the following monthly outcomes: 

• 90% of parents/caregivers are engaged by a Relative or other program staff member.
• 85% of parents/caregivers receive direct support or are connected to resources, for skill-building or well-being.

The core technology we leverage is the ancestral knowledge passed down from generation to generation to help mend the sacred hoop that has been broken among Lakotas. Relatives are experienced professionals with a deep connection to Lakota lifeways and knowledge. Because we highlight practices grounded in Lakota culture, our youth participate in programming involving ways of knowing and being, using the extended kinship model through naming ceremonies, making of relatives, coming-of-age ceremonies, healing camps, and other sacred traditions. Our teachings are guided by the Lakota values of respect, honor, courage, fortitude, generosity, and humility, all shown to be significant strengths in increasing protective factors.  

A strong cultural identity has been found to be an important protective factor for Indigenous youth against intergenerational trauma and a host of socioeconomic, health, and educational inequities. Early interventions grounded in cultural practices offer the greatest opportunity to promote long-term health and wellness and a reclamation of traditional ways of knowing and being. Indigenous worldviews center the importance of community-level relationships in child-rearing practices, prioritizing relationships beyond the parent-child relationship as essential for healthy development. In the Lakota extended kinship system, non-familial mentors are considered part of an individual's kinship structure. By co-creating an intentional, long-term program model that centers cultural practices while providing children and families the intensive, individualized, 1:1 support they need, we see a growth in personal, familial, and communal resilience as modern kinship systems are transformed and realigned to their traditional state.   

Our culturally specific programming approach to Lakota traditions and spirituality combines with our national network's 30 years of proven results to support Indigenous youth in developing social-emotional skills and community connectedness. The youth and families we serve face emotional challenges such as depression, substance abuse, collective trauma exposure, interpersonal losses unresolved grief, and related problems across generations because of historical trauma.

Data supports cultural connectivity having positive impacts on public health issues in Indigenous communities:

• The utilization of Indigenous language has been demonstrated to have a positive impact on physical and mental health, as evidenced by research conducted by Whalen, Moss, and Baldwin (2016).
• Suicidal ideation: Hallett, Chandler, and Lalonde (2007) surveyed Aboriginal language knowledge as it related to youth suicide rates in British Columbia. They found that communities where at least half the band members reported conversational knowledge of their Native language effectively experienced zero youth suicide rates, highlighting the protective role of linguistic heritage.
• Alcohol abuse: Stone et al. (2006) researched the resilience factors that prevent alcohol abuse in Indigenous populations by studying their life course patterns and found that engaging in traditional activities and practicing traditional spirituality had a significantly positive impact.
• Substance misuse: In a study published in the Journal of Primary Prevention in April 2017, Henson, Sabo, Trujillo, and Teufel Shone conducted a literature review to identify protective factors that promote health among American Indian and Alaska Native adolescents (Henson et al., 2017). Their research found several examples that cultural connectedness was a protective factor that positively influenced substance misuse among Indigenous youth.

Friends - He Sapa’s geographic service area includes Rapid City (Pennington County) and Oglala Lakota Nation (Oglala Lakota County). Services in both places benefit both communities and provide consistent and uninterrupted services to youth and families who move between the two areas. In addition to Rapid City, the communities we serve include Manderson, Porcupine, Wounded Knee, Pine Ridge, and Kyle on the Oglala Lakota Nation.

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Including both the Board of Directors and staff, we currently have 16 people at Friends of the Children - He Sapa.

I started my position as the founding Executive Director of Friends of the Children - He Sapa in August 2022. We are the first culturally specific chapter serving indigenous youth and families of the Friends of the Children network, which has 34+ chapters across the nation.  

Friends of the Children–He Sapa was intentionally formed with Indigenous leadership. All staff members and five of our six board members are Indigenous leaders. Staff and board members are committed to building an organization that centers Indigenous ways of knowing and being. We have a cultural advisor on staff to guide our work. Our experienced board and staff are deeply rooted in the community and are working in a holistic, culturally responsive way to support WoLakota (how to be a good relative) by building interconnected supports around and among Indigenous youth, Elders, kinship systems, and the community as a whole.

In addition, indigenous youth and families participate in service planning and decision-making. Caregivers and youth complete surveys annually to help us understand where our program has been most helpful, and where we can improve. The caring, trust-based relationships between Relatives (our professional mentors) and youth mean that the youth’s needs and wishes are honored. Youth feel comfortable providing ongoing formal and informal feedback, assuring that services and programming are relevant. Youth co-design their program experience by self-identifying their annual goals, and Relatives and youth decide together the activities they will engage in each week. Relatives also model self-advocacy within complex systems such as education, health care, and child welfare. 

Our work is guided by the community, for the community. From the name of the chapter (He Sapa, the Lakota name of the sacred Black Hills), to organizational leadership and programming, intentionality is the guiding principle in our approach in Rapid City and Wazi Ahanhan Oyanke. Both sites have a Community Advisory Committee made up of Indigenous youth, parents, community members, and program partners to provide input and guide our work. As we get to know our families and begin to build foundational, relational trust, we will incorporate additional strategies for caregivers to drive programming. Recognizing the many relatives and Elders present in the lives of children, caregivers are not narrowly defined as parents, but as any supportive adult who cares for the child. We are forming a community of caregivers and families who will help us create a vision and develop meaningful services.  

Our work as an Indigenous-led organization advances sovereignty. Our individualized, long-term services for youth and families support self-determination and agency, with ripple effects into adulthood and future generations. Our commitment to cultural learning, growth, and healing over 12+ years will build and sustain Lakota culture. Our willingness to partner with and learn from other organizations and our families will support regenerative growth and strength for the whole community.  

The social business model below conveys the strategies, impact drivers, intermediate outcomes, and long-term outcomes that our 1-on-1 professional mentoring program employs:

Friends-He Sapa is dedicated to achieving its mission of impacting generational change through long-term relationships using a multi-faceted approach. Ensuring the continued success and impact of the organization, we remain focused on expected results while providing culturally responsive support to improve the overall well-being of children and families in our program.

Expected Results: Sustained Impact on Indigenous Children and Families: Friends-He Sapa's commitment to holistic, empowering, and positively impacting enrolled Indigenous children and families in Rapid City and Oglala Lakota Nation through Lakota- grounded programming for 12+ years will continue. Impact will be evident through improved outcomes in education, skills development, health, empowerment, well-being, family stability, and cultural belonging among program participants. Our individualized services are highly adaptive and responsive to the needs of our community and families we serve as they shift over time.

Operational Excellence: Friends-He Sapa's dedication to maintaining a diverse and expert board, building a professional staff, optimizing operational efficiency, and fostering an evidence-driven culture will result in efficient and effective program delivery. This ensures resources are maximized to benefit the children and families we serve and the communities we partner with.

Financial Sustainability: The organization's focus on diversifying fundraising streams, securing significant grant funding partnerships, and leveraging resources contributes to long-term financial sustainability. This will enable Friends-He Sapa to continue offering vital services to enrolled children and their families at no charge.

Community Partnerships: Valuable partnerships enhance our ability to provide programming that supports the development of strength-based assets, remove barriers to healthcare resources, improve cultural connections, and strengthen family stability. Our community benefits from these partnerships allowing us to work with other organizations to provide thought leadership, extend community capacity, and integrate wraparound services.

Probability of Continued Support - Friends-He Sapa is well-positioned to garner continued support for 3 reasons: 

Demonstrated Impact: As an independent chapter of the high-impact national Friends of the Children network with 36 sites around the county, our program is grounded in 30 years of evidence-based practices and proven program success. Our model's track record of positively impacting children and families is a compelling testament to this work, inspiring investment from community stakeholders.

Diverse Funding Streams: Friends-He Sapa is committed to diversifying our funding sources to reduce dependency on a single revenue stream, enhancing resilience against future financial challenges. We do this strategically, guided by dedicated board members and staff leadership, ensuring ongoing financial sustainability and programmatic impacts.

Community Engagement: Through community partnerships and engagement, Friends-He Sapa extends our reach and demonstrates our relevance as a vital resource for addressing generational poverty and compounded trauma among Indigenous children and families in Rapid City and Oglala Lakota Nation.

Friends-He Sapa is committed to providing long-term programming that can impact sustainable change for families in our community, ending cycles of systemic harm and generational poverty.