Did the rape victim at Haskell Indian Nations University leave the school?

 

 

 

Did the rape victim from Saturday night’s attack leave Haskell Indian Nations University? If so where is her attacker? Does he remain in the dorms? Is this becoming status quo for Haskell? Are students who get in trouble there being told not to worry about it, because the head of Haskell’s student court will work with them? Are Haskell’s current administrators choosing to keep the wrong students at Haskell?

A brutal rape, four arrests in one night, all on the small campus of Haskell Indian Nations University in Lawrence, Kansas. One could argue it can happen anywhere, but for such a small campus as Haskell’s, four arrests in one night, is a lot, isn’t it?

Could it be that some Haskell housing staff and the current administrators are not doing their jobs? Are some housing staff allowed to bring their friends to work with them for entire shifts? Are those friends allowed to check the status of the dorm? While the employee makes quilts?

Or could it be that this all starts at the top? From President Barack Obama who is in charge of The Bureau of Indian Education, down to Larry Echohawk, Keith Moore, Stephanie Birdwell-Bighorn, to Haskell’s current administrators ( Venida Chenault) and Board of Regents ( George Tiger).

Shouldn’t Kansas Educators be yelling from the roof tops? After all Haskell is in Kansas is it not? Can government officials, educators, and the public at large simply turn their heads and look away because this is a government school for American Indians?

Did Larry Echohawk cry big tears at a talk he gave at Haskell over a year ago promising to make things better there, never to be heard from again? Now, he has a real reason to cry. Someone’s daughter, friend, granddaughter, Haskell student was brutally raped at one of his schools Saturday night. The much talked about change never came. Now at least one Haskell student is scarred for life.

It is against federal law for campus crimes not to be reported to the cleryact@securityoncampus.org. Are Haskell’s current administrators reporting the campus crimes? If not they are putting any Haskell student who receives federal student aid in jeopardy from being cut from that program.

The boarding school mentality of keeping everything bad that happens at Haskell a secret, is coming to a swift end.

It is our hope that Senator Pat Roberts is still working on his uphill battle to bring real leadership to Haskell, but, wait, could it be too late for that?

haskellnews commentary Oct 26, 2010.

Haskell Indian Nations University student arrested on rape charges. Is Haskell a dangerous place for students?

A Haskell student was arrested at Haskell Indian Nations University on charges of Forced rape, Criminal sodomy, Criminal restraint and theft. Is Haskell a dangerous place for students?

Maybe, now, whoever, the current “leadership” at Haskell is this week? Can get certain dorm staff to actually work? Current “leadership” Are you going to encourage Public Servants to come to work and do nothing? Except …chat with their friends all night? Make quilts and while they are at it why not have a drink? Instead they need to be patrolling the halls and keeping on eye on what is happening in the dorms. Isn’t a big problem at Haskell, that the dorm staff and others do not see themselves as public servants to the students?

Maybe, they need to stop worrying about room checks and start doing staff checks.

When is the last time the current leadership walked the dorms late at nights or early in the mornings? Who is Haskell’s safety officer now that Deborah Thompson is gone? Has Haskell made a report to the folks at Jeannie Clery yet?

From The Kansas University web site: Link: http://www.ku.edu/safety/ The Clery Act Annual Security Report In 1991, the U.S. Congress passed the Student Right-to-Know and Campus Security Act, which requires colleges to report the three previous years of crime statistics and campus security information and policies. The act was amended in 1992, 1998 and 2000. In October 1998, President Clinton signed an amendment renaming the act the Jeanne Clery Disclosure of Campus Security Policy and Campus Crime Statistics Act and requiring that crimes motivated by hate or bias be included in the statistics. In 2008, the Higher Education Opportunity Act added additional requirements for reporting, including but not limited to: emergency response and evacuation procedures, expanding the list of crimes motivated by hate or bias, reporting of fire safety information, and establishing a missing student notification policy.

Jeanne Clery by haskellnews

To contact the folks at Jeannie Clery: cleryact@securityoncampus.org. Because the law is tied to participation in federal student financial aid programs it applies to most institutions of higher education both public and private. It is enforced by the U.S. Department of Education. Institutions that fail to comply may be fined or lose eligibility to participate in federal student aid programs.

http://www.youtube.com/user/SDCcampussafety#p/a/f/2/7U-KB7tW-VQ

What are Haskell’s safety stats? Students, parents and the general public have a legal right to know.

Has anyone heard that Larry Echohawk recently stated (on more then one occasion) that The Bureau of Indian Education should turn the running of the BIE schools back over to the U.S. Department of Education? Apparently, even he realizes that change is needed?

President Barack Obama promised changed….where is Haskell’s?

haskellnews Oct 25, 2010.

Changing of the guard at Haskell Indian Nations University….again!

This week guarding the ever present boarding school mentality at Haskell Indian Nations University, in Lawrence, Kansas are two that have hardly ever stepped beyond its doors. Venida Chenault as ACTING president and Jim Tucker as ACTING vice president.

It would almost be funny if it weren’t so sad. The leadership at Haskell changes like a revolving door with no one there to push the stop button. Mean while the American Indian students ( 91% of them) are not graduating.

All we have to say about this is maybe Larry Echohawk or Stephanie Birdwell-Bighorn should send some clowns in to take over …… Oh, wait, don’t bother, they’re already there.

haskellnews commentary

Oct 13, 2010

A New Trail of Tears?

President Barack Obama’s political appointment for Assistant Secretary of Interior–Indian Affairs, Mr. Larry Echohawk appears to have embarked on a mission to bring national attention to the “state” of Indian education by journeying his own Trail of Tears.

In the last year, Assistant Secretary Echohawk has cried at Brigham

Young University, wept openly at The Pawnee Nation, shed tears at Haskell Indian Nations University and last week in San Diego at the National Indian Education Association he is reported to have dropped a crocodile tear or two.

It appears that Echohawk has now traveled the entire nation, north south east and west weeping. Is this apology Indian Country has been waiting for from the federal government?

Echohawk does not appear to be able to contain the mortification he has found in Bureau of Indian Education schools when he talks to Indian students and parents. Assistant Secretary Echohawk has now lasted longer than the last half dozen or so political appointments at that level, but surely the stress of such emotional commitment to Indian children must be getting to him.

It’s a good thing Stephanie Birdwell-Bighorn and Venida Chenault are social workers and can step up to counsel him.

Of course, we think it would be a better thing if  President Obama could appoint someone who actually did something positive for Indians kids instead of hiring and promoting totally unqualified people and then bawling because they screw up. But that’s because we believed President Obama had an Indian agenda—one that looked at education.

Likely you did too.

haskellnews commentary

Oct 11, 2010

Does Anyone Care about Haskell Indian Nations University’s Leadership Problems?

 

A video came out in The Lawrence Journal World on Sept 29, 2010 (Link: www2.ljworld.com/news/2010/sep/29/haskell-gets-16-million-federal-grant-make-ac) on it two Haskell students said Haskell needs more staff and one of them states that Haskell “staff are hard to find”. Of course they are, without, any true leadership in place, they are like little kids in a candy store.

Haskell doesn’t need more staff, they need staff that can actually find their way to work, correct ? And once they do stay there, work and not hide behind closed office doors, or bring their adult or minor children to work with them, correct ? Or, not put curtains up in their office windows, so the students can’t tell if they are in or not, correct ?

Here’s a policy suggestion no Haskell employee shall date the students? Nor come to work drunk or high? Why can’t those policies be put into place and if they already ? Why are Haskell employees not fired for disobeying them? Or are they ? Or are they caught and still employed by Haskell ? If Haskell has that type of leadership who can the students look up to ?

What about this for a policy ? If an employee leaves their office they will put a note on the door stating where they are at and what time they will return and then actually come back at that time? And if they aren’t then the student is to contact Michael S. Black Director of the Bureau of Indian Affairs in Washington D.C. and let him know about it. Since there is currently no leadership at Haskell, then the students need to go straight to the top.

One more policy: The Haskell instructor does not show up to teach the class? So a substitute is found? Instead of Haskell students being sent out of the classroom without the one thing they came to Haskell Indian Nations University for… an education, so many Haskell students are leaving without one.

With Dr. Linda Sue Warner, Haskell’s President still on detail ( which has now lasted a year ), Haskell has no real leadership and it’s showing…. the students aren’t graduating, at least 91-93% of them are NOT graduating.

When will Haskell’s leadership problems be resolved? For now The American Indians students who attend Haskell are suffering because it, the numbers don’t lie.

Does anyone care? Larry Echohawk where are your tears and promises of change for Haskell at now ? Maybe it’s time to be moving some of your top people around. You could start with putting Stephanie Birdwell-Bighorn back in the social work department, from which she hails, restructure your Haskell Board of Regents, bring Dr. Warner back to Haskell and try getting rid of some of those Haskell employees who are obviously not doing their jobs……

Note: Many of our readers have ask if Senator Pat Roberts has given up on Haskell ? The answer is no. It is our understanding that Senator Pat Roberts and his Kansas Delegation continue working to resolve Haskell’s problems.

haskellnews commentary

Sept 05, 2010

Haskell Indian Nations University’s Leadership Limbo

The best thing federal officials can do for Haskell Indian Nations University is resolve the school’s lingering leadership question.

Additional federal funds are one way to improve programs at Haskell Indian Nations University, but they don’t address the school’s No. 1 need: a permanent president who can set a strong course for Haskell’s future.

This week, the U.S. Department of Education announced a $1.6 million federal grant to improve academic quality, institutional management and fiscal stability at Haskell. It’s a significant amount of money for the school, whose annual allocation from the federal government is only $14.2 million. According to a representative of the Haskell president’s office, the money will be used to improve advising and student retention services, which is a good goal.

However, despite repeated assurances from the Bureau of Indian Affairs that a decision on the Haskell presidency is forthcoming, the school’s leadership remains in limbo. Linda Warner, who still is the school’s official president, has been fulfilling BIA assignments in other states for more than a year. In the meantime, Haskell has had three acting presidents, but no decision about a permanent president.

The $1.4 million grant is nice, but if federal officials really want to help Haskell, they should quit delaying and return Warner to Lawrence and allow her to oversee and initiate new policies and academic opportunities — or bring in another experienced, courageous, visionary academic leader.

Haskell gets $1.6 million federal grant to make academic and administrative improvements

By Mark Fagan

September 29, 2010

Haskell Indian Nations University is getting another $1.645 million from the federal government to help improve academic quality, institutional management and fiscal stability.

The U.S. Department of Education this week disclosed that it would provide Haskell with the grant as part of a department program for tribally controlled colleges and universities. The money becomes available Friday, for use during the next 12 months.

Stephen Prue, who works in the Haskell president’s office, said the money would help boost services in the Haskell Success Center, designed to provide centralized advising, retention, outreach and career-placement services.

The center, new this semester, is intended to help improve student engagement on a campus whose overall graduation rate — the combined total for students pursuing two-year associate’s degrees and four-year bachelor’s degrees — is 26 percent.

Because the grant is “new money,” Prue said, it is above and beyond the university’s annual allocation of $14.2 million as approved by Congress.

“This is very exciting news for us,” Prue said. “This will give us some opportunities, some resources, to improve retention and placement.”

To start, Prue said, the money likely will be used to add two retention specialists at the school, which is run by the federal government for American Indians and has an enrollment this semester of nearly 1,000 students from about 150 tribes.

Other eligible expenses for grant money include curriculum development and academic instruction; administrative management; establishing or improving endowment funds; and construction, maintenance, renovation and improvement of classroom, library, laboratory and other instructional facilities.

Is Haskell Indian Nations University’s New Windfall Just The Old TREO Grant?

A comment started us thinking: Is Haskell Indian Nations University’s new windfall, just the old TREO grant? The same one it has received for many years?

We looked around to see if an announcement had been put out by President Obama’s Team, about Indian schools receiving new monies and found…well …..nothing…..

The Title III TREO grant is given to schools by the Federal Department of Education , Haskell has received it for the past several years.

If this is what Haskell has just received, then it adds nothing new to their budget and would be an awful way to deceive The Haskell Student Body, The Indian Communities that Haskell Students represent, it’s employees and the public as a whole ( including The Lawrence Journal World ).

The TREO Grant could be used for The “new” Haskell Success Center….but ,isn’t that just the old TREO program with a new name?

Is it the TREO Grant or isn’t it the TREO Grant?

We looked for the big announcement in press releases by the U.S. Department of Education but it’s not there.

Surely, a grant as big as this would be announced on their web site?….Unless, of course, it is not a new grant? And then the question remains, have the current “leaders” at Haskell Indian Nations University tried to pull one over on all concerned?

Link: /www.ed.gov/news/press-releases

U.S. Dept of Education recent Press Releases:

September 29, 2010 Department Awards $3.5 Million to 15 Special Education Parent Centers; One Million Dollars to Ten Community Parent Resource Centers September 29, 2010 Education Secretary Arne Duncan Announces Twelve Grants for $50 Million to Charter School Management Organizations September 29, 2010 U.S. Department of Education Awards Nearly $15 Million in Elementary and Secondary School Counseling Grants September 27, 2010 Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands to Receive Nearly $12 Million in Additional Recovery Funds September 27, 2010 Guam to Receive More Than $24 Million in Additional Recovery Funds September 27, 2010 U.S. Virgin Islands to Receive More Than $23 Million in Additional Recovery Funds September 27, 2010 Puerto Rico to Receive More Than $174 Million in Additional Recovery Funds September 27, 2010 American Samoa to Receive More Than $14 Million in Additional Recovery Funds September 27, 2010 U.S. Department of Education Awards $3.5 Million in Charter School Leadership Grants to Support Projects of National Significance in the Charter School Sector September 27, 2010 US Department of Education Launches National Teacher Recruitment Campaign.

Maybe, now, we know why there is a gag order on ALL Haskell Employees?

haskellnews commentary

Sept 30,2010.

Is Haskell Indian Nations University Breaking The Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution?

With all of the talk from Stephanie Birdwell-Bighorn about making Haskell Indian Nations University a “premier university”, we can’t help but wonder why the school would possibly be stuck in the days of when it was a boarding school and continue with room checks?

Rooms checks at Haskell are done by housing personnel to see if students are keeping their rooms clean, if not the chance exist that they can lose housing and in the case of many Haskell students that would mean going home and not finishing school. With a nine percent graduation rate can Haskell really afford this?

Student rooms are checked for cleanliness and to see if the bed is made. These checks are done when most students are in classes. If a student is running late that day should they worry about making their bed or getting to class? Who wants someone in their living quarters when they are not there?

Is it really legal for dorm staff to be entering these rooms to see if a room is clean? These are not safety checks done by the safety officer and her staff, these are cleanliness checks. They are done once a week every week that school is in session.

They better be looking into this before some Haskell student wises up and sues the school over it.

Here is what the United States Constitution and FEDERAL LAWS HAVE TO SAY ABOUT IT:

“Virtually all room searches at public institutions are governed by the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution, made applicable to the states by the Fourteenth Amendment. The Fourth Amendment protects “[t]he right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures,” and provides that no search warrants shall issue “but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.” To be “reasonable” and thus lawful under the Fourth Amendment, a search must normally be conducted pursuant to a search warrant supported by probable cause. Conducting a search in violation of a student’s Fourth Amendment rights can render public university employees, and potentially the university itself, liable for damages under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. In addition, any evidence of criminal activity obtained in the search likely will be suppressed in ensuing criminal proceedings, and any subsequent investigation of criminal activity may be tainted as “fruit of the poisonous tree. Public institutions also may be subject to a state constitution’s analogous “search and seizure” provisions. These state constitutional provisions sometimes provide even greater protections against warrantless searches and seizures than does the Fourth Amendment. Courts will not uphold provisions in housing agreements that require a student to broadly waive all of his or her Fourth Amendment rights as a condition of campus housing”.

Link: http://www.calstate.edu/Gc/hot_topics_012109.shtml

You would expect a Mormon man (Larry Echohawk) to keep his word, so far no changes, only tears. The same people who lost Southwestern Indian Polytechnic Institute by The North Central Higher Learning Commission are still in charge of Haskell.

Mr. Echohawk is an attorney having come from The “Y” BYU to The BIA.

Maybe ….he can at least get what appears to be, illegal room checks at Haskell stopped?

haskellnews commentary September 29, 2010

Does Haskell Indian Nations University in Lawrence, Kansas, Follow Federal Guidelines?

Since Haskell Indian Nations University is a federal school ran by The Bureau of Indian Education, we wonder, are they following federal policy ?

Stephanie Birdwell-Bighorn and her posse ( the usual suspects, Dan Wildcat, Venida Chenault, Stan Holder, Chris Redman and assorted minions ( all of whom can travel on Haskell’s program dime) were at Haskell this past week trying to figure out how Haskell could “Give Back” the “Great Outdoors”. Say, shouldn’t that be “take back?” Maybe the activist VCEM and her think tank group in American Indians Studies should read Cobell v. Salazar ( http://www.CobellSettlement.com ).

If they want to work on something they should meet and to figure out how to keep Haskell’s accreditation since Southwestern Indian Polytechnic Institute just lost theirs with these folks at the helm. Or maybe figure out what those graduation rates, or lack of, are telling them. Maybe they could figure out that the more unqualified folks you hire? without advertising? the worse that place will get…We know, let’s work on a code of ethics for the Board of Regents, who wouldn’t meet and vote on it anyway.

Or maybe they should be figuring out what to do about the fact that someone in personnel might be recommending George Tiger’s ( for more on George Tiger google: thevoicesofcourage/georgetiger) unqualified friends for jobs?…..or maybe they should figure out how many people are going to get really hurt in those cells they call dorm rooms before the Bureau of Indian Education / Bureau of Indian Affairs gets sued out of existence? Actually, now that we think of it, the faction running Haskell right now has been unable to figure out anything productive to help the school.

What about housing? whoever, is currently in charge of Haskell ( if such a person exists)? needs to check and see if their federal employees ( specifically supervisors) are following federal guidelines? Which state: Federal employees may not solicit a contribution from another employee for a gift to either his own or the other employee’s official superior. (b) Or solicit Gifts ( maybe borrowing money or asking for rides )? from employees receiving less pay. ( Link: ecfr.gpoaccess.gov). This could not be happening on the Haskell campus…could it???

With a nine percent graduation rate one might be inclined to think the employees at Haskell should in every way be towing the line right now, which should include following federal policy for their own school.

Thanks Keith Moore and Larry Echohawk for “looking into the situation” at Haskell Indian Nations University.

haskellnews commentary Sept 27, 2010.