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 address you today in my role as president of Red Roots, a registered UIUC student organization whose members are Native American students with strong ties to our tribal nations. Throughout the day, I expect you will hear from individuals who claim they have Native blood from a grandmother or a grandfather. But their lives are such that this Native heritage is not a part of their daily lives. Some will speak in support of the Chief telling you how they feel honored by this symbol.

It is important, we believe, that you understand we are simply not another section of the anti-Chief voices that you will hear today. We are Native students who have chosen to attend this University. At present there are four of us who have direct experience with our Native heritage. I, for example, was born at an Indian hospital. I grew up on a reservation in northern New Mexico. The students I represent do not seek our Native identity, it is who we are, based on our daily lives, our lived experiences as members of a tribal nation.

As students, we pursue our degrees, we take classes and in the case of the graduate students, we conduct research and we teach for the University. Since 1988, Native students at the University have formed a student organization that has, without fail, issued position statements opposed to the use of the symbol or mascot known as Chief Illiniwek.

At its peak, the student organization has numbered no more than 12 to 15 students with this direct connection to their Native roots. Again, I refer to students with a meaningful tie to their Native heritage. We can tell stories that no one else can. We enrich the conversations on the campus in ways that no one else can, because of a lived experience of contact, daily contact with our roots.

Because we can tell these stories, we are often invited to speak to various organizations on campus, invited to speak to various classes on campus and in the community. There's a tremendous need for that kind of information. The community is looking for information they can't get at present at the University because there are no formal programs in existence.

Today, I want to ask that you listen to the Indian voice, the Indian voices in the community of Champaign-Urbana, to the Indian voices that are part of this University. We aren't part of an alliance. We are students. We are educators. We are parents. We are not activists, and we not been agitating solely for the removal of the Chief. As a group of Native students, we have proposed and worked in good faith in the last 12 years, indeed in times in partnership with the University administrators for these three items.

One, a Native American studies program that would provide the opportunity for all UIUC students to take course work about American Indian culture.

Two, the hiring of an assistant dean in students services whose primary responsibilities would include overseeing the needs of Native American students and the recruitment of additional Native American students.

Three, establishment of an Native American cultural house that would serve as a meeting place for Native students, but would also serve the community through cultural programs and activities that would enhance the educational experience of all students on the UIUC campus.

None of our efforts have borne fruit. In 1997, we responded to an invitation from student services administrators to work with them in the drafting of a job description for an assistant dean to serve Native American students. After months of work that culminated in the interviewing of six candidates for that position, we selected a candidate and expected her to be on campus within one month's time. Instead, the position was canceled due to lack of funds.

Just prior to that, we were told that we would be given a meeting place on campus. We expected it would be a private office area or a physical location similar to those enjoyed by the other ethnic minorities on campus. However, when we went to the place, it turned out to be two desks pushed together in the lobby of the Student Services Building.

As graduate students, we have networks and universities across the country through which we have learned that Native American professors at major universities would not come here if a position were available, nor do they counsel their students to come here. Each person we have spoken to cites the Chief as the major reason for his or her actions.

Clearly, all our efforts have been for naught. We believe this is directly related to the Chief. We believe the, quote, honorable image of the Chief has led to the derogatory treatment of Native students on campus. The attitude that embraces the Chief simultaneously denigrates and marginalizes our very existence on campus.

If there were a Native studies program and an assistant dean and a Native house, there would be more Native students here. However, a greater Native presence would also be a greater voice that would, in effect, become a threat to the romanticized notions of what it means to be a Native American, thereby it would be a threat to keeping the Chief.

Again, none of our efforts have been successful. We believe a true dialogue on this issue would mean talking to the people who are most directly affected, that means inviting we the Native students on campus to meet with the Board of Trustees for a conversation, a conversation about the many issues that we confront and deal with as students here.

In numerous venues, you have stated your commitment to Native students and your commitment to diversity on campus. Please hear our voice. Hear our request as Native students on campus, we live here, we work here, we study here. Invite us to your table for this conversation. Once again, we are offering our assistance, our help to you, the University. Invite us to talk with you, therein, we believe is the true honoring of the Native students on campus.

We urge you to retire the Chief and begin the healing process that needs to be begun, begin it here at home with your students. Thank you.

MODERATOR GARIPPO: May I ask you a question, do you regard the, is your argument like two issues, in other words, is the Chief part of only the problem, or is the Chief one issue and all these other --

MS. REESE: We believe the Chief is the major obstacle to achieving the other things that need to be in place.

MODERATOR GARIPPO: If everything that you requested were granted, I have no authority to do any of those, but if everything that you requested were to be granted, and the Chief would stay, would that still be a, represent a problem with your organization?

MS. REESE: I believe that if the Chief stayed and efforts were made to actually have a Native students program, a Native house, recruit additional students, increase the Native presence on campus, then there would be a greater educational opportunity for everyone on campus to learn what it is to be a Native American. And through that process, people would come to understand why the Chief is a negative, problematic stereotype.

And I can point to an example from yesterday. A former, a graduate of the University wrote to me, he was a 1963 graduate, his name is Dan Airand, he is currently in Connecticut. He wrote to ask what was our position on our experience here. I described it to him. He was outraged, he said if he had known any of the information that I shared about what it is to be a Native student, what it is to be here, he would ask for the removal of the Chief also.

MODERATOR GARIPPO: Thank you. Charlene Teters.

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