Not sure how to explain this so I'm gonna try the best I can. Several years back (when I first went to college) I found out from the college that if I can prove my Native American heritage to be atleast 1/4 bloodline that I can get my school for free (along with other benefits as well). Well I know I have well over 1/4 Native American. My mother's mother's mother (lord now thats a mouthful lol) was 100% Cherokee and my mothers fathers mother was 100% Cherokee as well. Well Also, my father's mother's mother was 100% Cheyenne and my father's father's mother was 3/4 Cherokee. Confused yet? LoL. Anyways we are trying to figure out what we need to do to prove the heritage for schooling purposes. I was curious if anyone on the site might have some info? I was thinking probably a profession genealogy would be needed?Any info would be great. We called the local college and waiting for a response back from them.
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Proving Native American heritage..
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As you may have guessed by my avatar I am NDN. If you want to prove that your cherokee that is fairly easy. first check out the following site Cherokee Nation Offical Wedsite you should be able to begin your quest from here, maybe able to get phone numbers if nothing else. As for proving your heritage...well first contact the tribe home office, because some tribes like mine have closed rolls. I don't know whether the Cherokee rolls are opened or closed. By closed or opened rolls I mean, you may drag grandmas frail carcuss in there and she may obviously be a full blood but if her name, or her dads name, or her great-grandmas name was not on the last roll taken in 18whatever then it doesn't matter. If the roll is closed and your forbearers name is not on the list than your not getting in. Now having said that I think the Cherokees are pretty easy to get into....everybody and their dog's great-great-great-grandma was a cherokee princes...whatever that is...LoL, J/K...NDN humur, please forgive.As for the great white myth of a free education...well let me just say I've never met the NDN yet who's gotten it. The only exception to that is if you go to Haskell Indian School in Lawrence KS, Dartmouth in New Hampshire (Yes it was founded as an NDN school) or the Native American Arts Inst. in New Mexico. There may be a handful of other schools that nobody has ever heard of, but I don't know what they are.Generally NDN's go to school just like everybody else on grant, pell grant, loans, scholarships or as in my case mom and dad forking out the cash. Well I take that back, I did get $150 dollars a semester from the tribe. If you have any questions I'll be glad to help, just PM me.
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Thanks for the info, it atleast gives me a starting point. I have found some info on free tuition but doesn't tell me anything about what's needed to get it. My cousins and I are trying to do all the research, gets alittle frustrating at times.Again thanks for the info!
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If the free tuition, your talking about, is what I think it is, it works pretty much like a scholorship. The tuition is waved by the school if you are an inrolled member of the tribe with tribal membership card, just a CDIB (certificate degree of Indian Blood)card, issued by the U.S. government, doesn't do it anymore. It has to be a tribal issued membership card. Anyway, you present the school with a copy of your card, your grades and your sat's then they will select say five of the best applicants for a tuition waver. So in all practicality its really no different than any other scholorship or grant a school awards. Furthermore, maybe 1/10th of the schools offer this, just like any other scholorship it is offered and their discretion.
Hope this helps.
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Yup sure does and you're right the school wants a copy of the card and it works like a scholarship. I have done well in school thus far (4.0) and hope to keep it there, so hope that'll help me in the long run.Again, you've been fantastic! Thanks for the info.
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Is it true that if you have any black ancestry you can't claim Indian ancestry? That's something I'd heard.
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No, thats not true at all. In fact many members of the Creek tribe are part black and several of the eastern tribes are mostly black and little NDN. It is simply more common for members of the civilized & eastern tribes than the plains or southwest tribes to be racial mixed with blacks.