In 1829, Dakota leader Mahpiya Wicasta (Cloud Man) led a group of Dakota men on a hunt. The group became trapped in a blizzard for three days, buried under the snow. He later founded an agricultural community on the site, which he called Ḣeyate Otuŋwe, on the shores of a lake that Dakota people today call Bde Maka Ska. Nearly two centuries later, Cloud Man’s great-great grandchildren led the charge to reclaim the lake’s Dakota name, after having long been named after white secessionist John Caldwell Calhoun.” We don’t call it a change, we call it a restoration,” descendant Katherine Beane says when asked about the renaming of Lake Calhoun to Bde Maka Ska.

With as few as 1,000 Native speakers of Ojibwe remaining, preserving the language is more important than ever. It’s “a big effort to not lose who we are; how we view the world is in the language,” says Professor Brendan Fairbanks, who works tirelessly to revitalize the language through teaching, research, and special programming.

Due to rising sea levels, the Pacific Islands are struggling with cultural loss as Natives are forced to relocate. To counteract the potential loss of water practices in Pacific Islander cultures, Professor Vince Diaz is working on three major canoe projects that will work in tandem to maintain and adapt their ancient traditions.

Professor Jean O'Brien has been awarded the Dean's Medalist award for 2018. As a historian and a mentor, one of her goals is to explore and teach the importance of persistence.