Wakinyan LaPointe is a Sicangu (Burnt Thigh) Lakota citizen of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe. Mr. LaPointe will begin his tenure as an American Studies Ph.D. student at the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities with a Master of Nonprofit Management from Hamline University and a B.A. of Political Science from the UMN. His research interests include Indigenous human rights and the right to water; treaty rights and federal-Indian law; Indigenous knowledge systems; political-economic development; and Indigenous organizational models designed to advance these fields.

Since 2014, Wakinyan has advised Indigenous delegations and led human rights campaigns providing strategic intervention statements at the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (NYC) and the Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples at the Palais des Nations in Geneva, Switzerland. He is the Co-Director of the Mni Ki Wakan (Water is Sacred): Global Indigenous Water Decade (2017-present); Co-Project Manager of the Indigenous Youth Research & Development Center; Co-Facilitator of the Mde Maka Ska Community Conversations (2015-Present); and works in Indigenous-led philanthropy.

Wakinyan centers the importance of tiwahe (family) and the Lakota worldview in his work. He is a woyake wicasa (Lakota storyteller), olowan wicasha (traditional Lakota singer), and is passionate about the Lakota language.