Native Youth Know How to Improve Public Health & Safety

Today at Arizona’s Indian Nations and Tribes Legislative Day, five talented and energized youth groups are presenting how they are going to make their communities safer and healthier. With the “Native Youth Know” partnership standing behind them, the five youth groups will receive the funding and support to make that possible.

The Native Youth Know partnership between the Arizona Commission of Indian Affairs, the Inter Tribal Council of Arizona and National Relief Charities is engaging youth-led groups to develop creative solutions around issues of public safety, health and well-being. From the youth of today develop the leaders of tomorrow.

Today, we would like to acknowledge and congratulate the five recipients of the “Native Youth Know” grants and the solutions they identified for tribal communities throughout Arizona:

1. Based on the Hopi Reservation, the Hopi Junior and Senior High School student government will develop a park and recreation area to serve the youth and adults living in the school’s housing complex. By enhancing this area, the student government will increase access to places where people of all ages can become more active and improve health and wellness.

2. The Native American Music Fund from the Fort Defiance and Window Rock communities on the Navajo Reservation has a track record for promoting music and raising funds for guitars and pianos, which were given to Navajo youth. Using the Native Youth Know grant, they will host three Teens for Music workshops in three Navajo communities, including music lessons and performances from local and known musicians.

3. Elsewhere on the Navajo Nation, the fifth and sixth grade classes at the Little Singer Community School are resolved to revitalize and enhance the school’s efforts toward nutritional values. They will promote nutritional, environmental and cultural well-being through renovation of a school greenhouse and development of a sustainable garden.

4. On the Pascua Yaqui Reservation in Guadalupe, middle and high school students in the Lutu’uria Youth Group are collaborating with college students from the Yonokame Group to address issues rooted in historical trauma and loss of culture. They will address the issues through teachings of Yaqui history.

5. The Miss Pascua Yaqui Program in Tucson is committed to educating youth and the community about their ancestral diet as well as edible plants and fruits harvested from the environment. They will organize teaching by Elders and develop a community garden to grow the plants and trees essential to the Yaqui ancestral diet.

We congratulate these Native American youth for taking a leadership role and contributing in creative and positive ways to the safety, health and well-being in tribal communities.