Analiza: Welcome to the Women of Color Rise Podcast. I'm Analiza Quiroz Wolf, proud Filipina American, mom of two, and former CEO of a nonprofit and Captain in the US Air Force. I'm on a mission to support having more diverse leaders at the table. We'll be talking with successful CEOs and C suite women leaders of color and learning about their leadership journeys. If you're a woman or woman of color, who wants a seat at the table, you're in the right place. Now let's get into today's show.

I'm thrilled to be welcoming Diana Cournoyer. Today, she is of the Oglala Sioux tribe, and she's Executive Director of the National Indian Education Association. It's impressive, Diana, the work you've done to have the impact go beyond the US Capitol, to actual impact for communities across the Indian Country. She's done things like helping with broader teaching hiring initiatives, she's had more opportunities for others to visit tribal communities, and billions of dollars in grant funding for NIEA. She's testified before Congress, rallying support for Native education, just inspiring trust and collaboration among all communities, including Native nations. It's exciting Dianna to have you, because I think your voice, your uniqueness, the importance of native history in our country needs more light shed on it. So thank you, thank you so much for being here.

Diana: I agree 100%. So thank you for this opportunity

Analiza: Diana, when you were young, talk to us about your experience coming from your tribe. And did you dream that you would be testifying in front of Congress?

Diana: No, as an introverted person, like we spoke about off camera off air? No, my dream was to work with animals and not with people, you know, very shy, very introverted, borderline fearful of the world. And I just thought, animals, unconditional love, they will let you know if they're unhappy with a bite or bark or a kick. And it was just so clean. You were either well, like a fun animal or you're not. And as a child, that's just what I felt that where my happy place would be would just be helping so still, always helping still always had the compassion and the space of injustice, right saving animals that were struggling or helping animals that were struggling, so always fighting for injustice, but I never wanted to be fighting for injustice. For my People. I always thought I'd be behind the scenes, very quiet. And making an impact on an animal's life

Analiza: It was the pivoted Dianna because I can imagine were you taking care of animals as a young person? Then there was like a child who entered your world like how did you go?

Diana: No, it wasn't a child. Actually, it was in college, I took a Native American studies class, Native American studies, I think it was around education, Indian education history. And then I also took an intercultural communications class or multicultural communications. So it was those two classes in my junior year in college, that I realized the injustice of my own people. My whole life, I was born and raised in an urban setting, Dallas, Texas, always knew, of course, knew I was native, understood what that meant, did have a cultural connection, understood my identity, my grandmother raised me or lived with us. So I heard boarding school stories. I heard stories of reservation life, I heard hardship, I heard, you know, boarding school surviving stories. But I just thought that that was just my grandmother and my grandfather. And I just thought that was my family. I didn't realize how, you know, as a child, you don't understand that that one story is multiplied by millions. And it wasn't until college and my junior year in school that I realized that one story that I'd heard my whole life didn't impact and affect millions of my own people. And it was that year, probably in my early 20s, that I said, There's got to be something else that I can do.

Analiza: The story of boarding schools and the taking away basically taking care of children from their communities, their ritual language, I have to admit for me, I learned that much later in life. It wasn't part of my standard curriculum. And it's not dissimilar to what's happened to communities across the world, even Filipinos and our assimilation to speaking English. Being as white proximate as possible, bleaching our skin and getting taught by the nuns, you know, we're very violent, right? We do not be. So this education, I think is important for our own identities as well as all children to know even if that wasn't their culture, there's importance and understanding. And so can you talk to that? I know, Diana, you're very passionate about understanding, sharing stories. What do you wish that more people knew particularly about? The native culture history? Just I know, there's a lot. That's a very loaded question. But is there anything you're like, you know, more people need to know. And then fill in the blank.

Diana: I think first off more people, educators, advocates, the general community need to know our boarding school history, they need to know federal policy that impacted Native people, not just in education, they need to understand the treaties. They need to understand that those treaties didn't go away. But they didn't expire, that there's still a treaty in our trust responsibility between the federal government and 574 nations, tribal nations, or Native nations, they need to understand. It doesn't matter when those treaties were signed, that treaties were broken, promises were broken, death, manipulation, that all of that happened to get to where we are right now. That's what I want people to understand. I understand or I feel like when I am talking to a non native population, you know, a multicultural population, I get the sense that it's, our story is falling on deaf ears. Because you see, you have what you just talked about, you have an immigrant story and Asian or Chinese story or Filipino story and African American stories, slavery story. You have immigrants on Ellis Island, you have an Irish story, you have an Italian story.

Everyone has their unique story that lives here in the United States. And I hear and I respect, and I understand, but our story, Native people, indigenous peoples, whatever, you know, folks want to call us, our story is actually the first story. That's what I want people to not just understand, but go beyond comprehending. Go beyond. Yes, it happened. So sorry, it happened. But let's move on. Because that's not what you do. What has happened to Native people, is what you just talked about, it's a stealing of culture. It's a stealing of identity. It's the erasure of who we have been for since time immemorial.

And we were told for such a long time, that wasn't good. Being Native wasn't good. being nomadic wasn't good, believing in a creator, but not God, or Christianity wasn't good. So since contact, we've been told that we're not good. We've been told that we're not of this world, or of this earth, or that we don't deserve rights. And now we're just supposed to snap and say, Yeah, we're supposed to forget all that, and blend into whatever the American culture is right now, or this American education system. If we're talking specifically about education, we can't do that. We, as Native people cannot do that.

And that's what I want people to understand, stop forcing this American education system, which was created to civilize American people. It was created after the Civil War, this American public education system was established after the Civil War, so that both the north and the south children and communities could begin learning the same information, learning it the same way and be industrialized. That's what we are, we're still using this right now. That's the foundation of the American public education system. That system is used to civilize American children.

We're not American, we're 574 different ways of thinking and different philosophies and different languages, different cultures and different identities. There's got to be another system that works for us, that works for Native people. Now, I know there's, you know, very loaded, what I want people to know, because I know the public systems in urban settings or cities, it's a little harder to change. But now you're getting even deeper into the richness of multicultural identities. Okay? You got Indians going to school with blacks going to school with Hispanics and Asians and immigrants. So let's create a school system or a learning system that respects diverse identities, that all your identities and all of your life experiences, help you be a stronger learner, in a system that should be created to support your learning adventure, not teaching, not education. But your learning should be a dialogue between you the learner, and your teacher, your leader. It should be a back and forth relationship that you're creating with whoever's in the classroom. And it's not.

Analiza: Yeah, I mean, I just think about how I used to serve in the military. And in some ways, there are a lot of parallels between our education system of control, yes, and what is right, and what is wrong. There's one way, and that's the right way. Anything else is wrong and bad. And there is not just education content, right, academic content, but there's also our own identities of enough and that, actually, it's the diversity, it's the breadth, it's the unique experience that make us awesome, right? And like, and we can learn from each other. So yes, yeah, I think a lot about academics, and how much you and I both educators and how much we have tried to work with these distinctions. And yet, there's a little bit of a call to start over.

So as someone who has a program, I know you've worked in different programs, tribal communities, and also at the university level. Diana, is there a way in which you mentioned having diverse perspectives, allowing to share stories having a dialogue between teacher and student? Is there a way in which education, if you could make one design change to existing, there's many design changes. But if you could say, in addition to that relationship between teacher and student and grounding, multiple identities, or any other design change, you'd really push for to help ground us in the first nations history, understanding our shared history.

Diana: Absolutely, it's a model that education leaders have been talking about, for a very long time. And it really hasn't caught on because to emotion centered and liberal or driven, but it used to be called social emotional learning, it has now transitioned after the pandemic, to what people are calling the whole child policy, implementing a whole child policy, as well as practice and pedagogy is very close to what we call an indigenous education system.

It is creating relationships with your students, first and foremost, you got to build trust, you got to build respect, you got to build that ability to be vulnerable, you the adult needs to be vulnerable, as well as the kid needs to be vulnerable. That takes a lot of time. And much like the system we have now. It's so academic, there isn't time to get to know your students. And there isn't time to have that emotional connection, in a simple conversation in your right is very military driven, or this military focus is authoritarian. I'm the leader of the authority figure in this classroom and what I say goes, Okay, and I demand respect.

And that's where I think you lose a lot of native students in our culture, you earn respect, I will respect you first and foremost as an adult, but I will, you will earn my respect if you learn who I am. And I don't think that's an indigenous philosophy. I think that should be a national philosophy. I think that should be how all teachers approach our students, and how all educators approach parents, the richness of a parent's background and the richness of the students background, whether we want it to impact our students as teachers or not.

It does, I feel like I could say, I am an example of introverted, highly successful Native student, because of who my grandparents were. And the way they raised my father, and the boarding school systems that they were products of. So I don't know my language, but I have a strong identity. I know my culture, I know where my homelands are. But I don't understand the language, language for native and this is for all tribal speakers, all native tongues, the language is what holds our spirituality. It's what holds our cultural practices, and it's what connects us to all of our ancestors that have passed on. If you take that language away. We lose these things slowly over time, and all you have to hold on to is maybe the color of your skin, or maybe your last name.

My name is Cournoyer. It's just a French American name. But Cournoyer you're in tribal communities is a very well known native, tribal name. It's a well known family across North and South Dakota. That name carries a lot of history. Our names carry a lot of history, if teachers would just understand, not just take a moment and understand if you're a white horse, and you're living here in Oklahoma City, ask a student, where are they from? What's their tribal connection or tribal community?

White Horse is not a Caucasian name. It's not an African American name. It's not a Hispanic name. It's a native name. And there's such a history, or behind that name, rich history that actually defines who that person is whether they're five years old, or 15 years old, that you can't ever take away as a teacher. And you can't take that away as an education system. But our education systems could take advantage of the experiences and the knowledge and the brilliance of that native kid, if you just start asking questions of who they are, and their identity,

Analiza: Diana, what's coming to mind for me is the belief for educators to connect with kids as people and to see them as beautiful. And there's depth in history and culture and family. And if we don't build relationships, and actually establish real rapport of trust and respect, it's a missed opportunity. And we can do harm, right? Having a ratio of the specialness that makes people know that they're valued with all of the history and all of their experience. So that so resonates. I'm curious, Diana, I want to pivot to you as a leader, you've shared multiple times about being an introvert. And as someone who speaks in Capitol Hill testifies at many large group events, who will be moderating Pahara event in the summer, how has your introversion been, then something maybe you've leveraged? Not to necessarily work around? I'm curious, you know, how do you think of it because you actually declare, hey, I'm an introvert, and I'm leading and having an impact. So can you share your experience? As an introvert? How do you maybe use that even as a strength? How do you manage and pivot? I'd love to hear more about that.

Diana: That's like such a multifaceted question. But I'm going to address you know, speaking in front of people first and foremost, although being an introvert, I do have a passion to educate. And the only way you can educate people in today's world is either through social media, or having conversations with them. I love to have conversations with people. And when I do speak, I never even attend Keynote events. Even on the hill, when I gave testimony, I followed protocol, but I also told stories, and that's blending my introverted space. I have uncomfortable speaking in front of people with what I need to get across. And I have to meet these certain guidelines, you know, for whatever event I'm speaking at.

But I love to tell stories. And I love to tell stories that are filled with knowledge, leave people questioning their own behavior, I love to be able to share information that will make people walk away and change the way that they think about an issue in the world, specifically on education, the way that they look at the way their work, I want to leave an impact. And so I have to put my sometimes fear of speaking in front of people, I really do have to put it to the side. And I just have to find that I don't know there's something about when I speak in front of people, I go into a different place. Because after I'm done speaking, I have no idea what I've said, even though I have a script, because most often I go off script, but I have no idea how well I did. I don't have a sense or an understanding of how I engage the audience? Did they look like they were interested, but I've had my staff video me, record me, come with me. And I've left people in tears. I've made people laugh. But all I want to do is leave an impact.

Analiza: I hear the bigger mission helps to push past the fear of speaking in front of people, maybe questions of failure, worries and anxieties and saying I've got a message. I feel passionately about that. More important than me. And I'm going full throttle.

Diana: That's right. And I don't know anyone else that speaks this truth, the way that I do, so I just feel like it's an obligation. It's a responsibility that I continue to tell my stories as long as people will listen. stories are powerful. Often I feel like stories are with people. It's not going to be a graph not going to show you will say okay, now I want to change my life based on their story from your life that you could share with us to help us learn more and be more as an integral we'll continue down the introvert road as an introvert. I never had the confidence to stand up in front of an audience.

I never had the confidence to stand up in front of a classroom in elementary, middle and high school, didn't have the confidence to even stand up in front of my family and speak Intel, it was about high school teenage years where you have to do more speaking in front of what student councils, student government, you're just out there more as a high school student, especially somebody who's an overachiever, like I was. And my grandmother told me, there should be no fear in you, standing up in front of people, because you're the expert, whatever you're standing up, and you're talking about, you research, anything, whether you're doing a presentation, whether you're reading a paper, you always are so careful with your research. And you're so critical of yourself, you're going to research every topic to the 9th degree so that you are the expert.

So when I do write my speeches, or when I've been asked to speak on a very specific topic, if I only know you know, a little bit, or I can touch upon something like early learning Headstart, I can fake it. But I don't want to fake it when I'm going to do a keynote. So I will do research, several days of research. And I will be even in an early learning Headstart conference, I will be the knowledge keeper standing at the front of the room when I'm doing that speech. And I think that's a product of being an overachiever, but also an introvert, I don't ever want to let anybody down. I don't ever want to be responsible for taking people's time, I value people's time. And I never want to take that away from them, I never want to stand up and talk and just share nothing that's worthless to their job, when they can be doing so much to impact students.

So I take all of those feelings in everything I do from this podcast to Capitol Hill. And I make sure that any words that come out of my mouth are purposeful, impactful, and that anyone who's going to listen to this will walk away and at least start thinking about how can I change the way I approach the work I do. We don't have a lot of time, in this world, in the work that we do.

As women of color, women that are leaders, we have to be very careful what we say and how we say it, or we will lose our audience, we're already starting pretty far back in the starting line. Because we're women, and more minorities. So whatever we say, we gotta say it with such impact and influence in very little words, or people are going to dismiss us. And we can't change that, that society. So we can't fight that. I don't want to waste our energy fighting that. But I figured out a way to get around that. That's how I approach anything that I do.

Analiza: And there's so much truth to that there is a system we're operating in and to tell our young people just go out, be yourself. And don't worry about what will happen. I mean, that is a beautiful words of wisdom. And yet we are doing that within the system. And there are judgments placed on us and to be purposeful, well researched, speak with conviction concisely. And also with authenticity, right? There's, that's where that piece in your own, your own unique, yes, for being at the table value. But we have to consider that we do that with purpose and with conviction as well.

Diana: Whenever I was growing up again, my grandmother was very influential. And she spoke Muskogee Creek, I'm also Muskogee Creek. And her mother told her when she went off to the white school that they called it to be very careful what she says in English, because again, as a native person, the simplicity of our language wasn't translatable into English. And so all the nuns that when she went to school, boarding school, the nuns would lie. All the white folks, the white people at the school at the boarding facility would lie. And so the and I think this is a pretty common belief in a lot of our native elders, that tongues are sharp when you speak the English language, because oftentimes it was the English speaking people that lied to them that manipulated our native people that hurt or native people.

So as a child growing up, I was always told by my grandmother, be careful what you say because your tongue is sharp, because he used the English language. Now if I could have spoke Muskogee creek or Oglala, it's a softer language, I think indigenous languages in general, whether it's a native indigenous, Asian, indigenous, I think indigenous languages are softer. Even when you criticize somebody in my opinion, Oglala. It's softer than the English tongue. So that's also a piece of my advice to young people.

When you get angry, or when you're hurt, stop and think, right Stop, think process and breathe. Because the words that you use in the English language are so sharp and harmful, that they could kill somebody, really, they can push somebody to death.

And that's also a piece that I carry as a reminder of whatever words I'm putting out there, I need to be able to support them, I need to be able to back them, I need to be able to believe in them. So I don't want to use my tongue to put anything harmful and bad out there.

Analiza: So much purpose and thought, and as an introvert, I really appreciate learning about your perspective, because you can have a massive impact and also still stay true to yourself. So seeing that so much, you know, with that I actually wanted to lighten the mood a little bit and go to lightning round questions.

Diana: Okay.

Analiza: Okay. Here we go. Chocolate or vanilla,

Diana: Chocolate.

Analiza: Cooking or take out

Diana: Cooking

Analiza: Would you rather climb a mountain or jump from a plane?

Diana: Oh, my climbing mountain

Analiza: Have you ever worn socks with sandals?

Diana: No.

Analiza: What is your reading of yourself in terms of karaoke? On a scale of one to 1010? Is Mariah Carey?

Diana: Oh, as an introvert, I'm like the zero negative one I would never get on a karaoke stage.

Analiza: What's a recent book you read?

Diana: The Purpose of Introverts

Analiza: What is your favorite way to practice self care?

Diana: I'm still trying to figure that out.

Analiza: What's a good professional development you've done?

Diana: I would say that Pahara Institute, that's my most recent and most beneficial.

Analiza: What's your definition of a Boss Mama?

Diana: Someone who has the good balance of love, compassion and grace, but can carry a heavy hand and a heavy hand of respect, admiration and responsibility.

Analiza: What advice would you give your younger self? Diana?

Diana: Don't be so afraid.

Analiza: And then where can we find you like LinkedIn or anywhere else?

Diana: I'm on LinkedIn. I'm on Instagram. It's just my name. Just dianacournoyer. LinkedIn, Instagram and Facebook.

Analiza: And then last question, do you have a final ask or recommendation or parting thoughts to share?

Diana: No, I do feel like I've, as the introvert is telling me I've said enough.

Analiza: Diana I appreciate your authenticity. And it's incredible. I think as an introvert, you don't have to let this stop you. In fact, you can use this to your thoughtfulness and what you share and connect and have impact. So really, really appreciate Diana, thank you.

Diana: Thank you. I had fun. I enjoyed all the questions. I hope I do have a final thought. I do hope whoever is watching this does feel the power in themselves to make change, because that's where it starts.

Analiza: Awesome.

Diana: Thank you.

Analiza: Thank you so much for carving out time today to hear today's podcast. Three things before you go. First, if you found it helpful, please leave a five star review. Second, please share with someone else you can share the link and posts on Facebook and say check it out. Lastly, I want to thank you for being a listener and you can go to get a free self care bonus called juice your joy at analizawolf.com/freebonus. Thank you so much