Understanding Native American/Indigenous Students College-Going Through Indigenous Paradox and Pathways

• In Event: Reimagining Pathways: Higher Education Enrollment Aspirations and Barriers Facing Minoritized, Agentic Populations

Abstract

This Indigenous qualitative study explores the college-going pathways of thirty-seven Native American/Indigenous college students attending colleges in the Southwest region of the lands currently called the United States. Through a pathway (Cajete, 1994) and Indigenous paradox (Maryboy, Begay, & Nichol, 2006) framework, this manuscript disrupts a widely accepted research practice where higher education college-access research (e.g. college choice process) is separate from higher education retention research (e.g. retention & persistence models). This manuscript interrogates the separate and individualized narrative of college-going to identify how diverse ways of knowing and being can improve college access, trajectories, and transitions.

Authors

• Chris A. Nelson, University of Denver

• Stevie Lee, University of Denver