The following transcript is from the 4/14/00 Chief Illiniwek dialogue "intake session". It is an unedited excerpt from the original U.I. document.

I am giving this background to make you aware of a perspective of a community that has worked and struggled to offer programs to recruit and keep Native Americans in school. The dropout rate for Native Americans in the Chicago public school system is around 70 percent or higher.

And we are up against institutions of higher education that do not recognize the value of offering a curriculum in Native American history and culture. The lack of inclusion of Native American history and culture in the public school system and institutions of higher ed is exactly what has contributed in large part to the dropout rate of Native American students, but is also definitely a contributing factor to this continued argument.

I always hear throughout these last ten years of this fight against the Chief Illiniwek mascot that, you know, that Chief Illiniwek honors us as a people, honors and respects who we are. I feel it's an empty statement completely, because the image was born out of an era that proudly boldly produced cartoon images of all ethnic groups. It came out of the era that produced the black Sambo image.

Since that time most, a lot of those images have since been properly classified as racist. It would never be utilized in promotional or commercial campaigns, yet here we are in a ten- year long argument trying to convince students, alumni and the public at large that this mascot is offensive, racist and should be stopped. Why is there a resistance to this argument? With most other ethnic minorities groups it would have been a much quicker decision.

The idea that Chief Illiniwek honors the Native Americans, again I feel it comes from a lack of knowledge about who we are as Native American people. Again, there are not very many Native American studies programs that are offered in the public school system or institutions of higher ed, at the moment, today we are trying to begin a dialogue at Truman College where we can offer Native American students programs.

But it's always been a continuing struggle for us in Chicago, and across America for us to instill the importance of our inclusion in Native American history and culture.

I cannot stress enough of the importance of the need to incorporate Native American history and culture into the curriculum or public school institutions of higher education nationwide. I believe that the reason we are still arguing on this issue is because nonIndians and the general public's argument is coming from a position of ignorance. Ignorance of who we are except from, you know, from the small blurbs out of history books and more about the knowledge, I think that more of the knowledge really comes from the point of reference that come out of the John Ford cowboy western movies that Hollywood produced.

If you make the right decision to do away with this mascot, it would be a big step forward in our fight to do away from other sports mascots representing collegiate and professional sports teams. We can also begin a dialogue about developing and offering a curriculum that includes Native American history and culture.

And I just as a final statement wanted to say that I am here representing my community and I am also representing my own children and I am hoping that you go in the decision to do away with it to make our lives a little bit easier and our struggles to educate our own in the general public of who we are. Thank you.

See the U.I. Dialogue on Chief Illiniwek page for more transcripts and information.