The strength of the relationships reflects the strength of a community.
Alisse Ali-Joseph, faculty athletics representative at Northern Arizona, and Nicole Been, senior director of academics and student-athlete success at the Big 12 Conference, are both Indigenous former student-athletes and college athletics administrators.
What started as a work-related connection has become a lifelong sisterhood for Ali-Joseph and Been. Now, the two have created the inaugural Native Student-Athlete Summit with the NCAA office of inclusion. Their friendship has proven the importance of creating community, and their goal is to create that community for Native American student-athletes, administrators and allies.
The two spoke recently about their friendship and their hopes for the summit.
Ali-Joseph (pictured with her daughters) hopes to create pathways for Indigenous youth like her children to enter college athletics. (Photo courtesy of Alisse Ali-Joseph)
Been: We have known each other for five years.
Ali-Joseph: Yeah, I think since 2020. We met over Zoom for a long time, and then we met in person. We went and did some advocacy work at the Women's Final Four in Minneapolis with our Indigenous Athletics Advancement team, and then we've just been sisters ever since.
Been: Our friendship is priceless. To think that we've only known each other for four or five years is crazy because I feel like I've known Alisse forever. If you've ever been around her, she just has this spirit of just welcomeness and love and comfort. Just simply seeing her smile or getting a hug from her is everything.
She's passionate about the work that she does, she's passionate about those that she serves, and so again for me, as she said, it's a sisterhood. Anytime that I'm able to engage or interact with her, get a text message, it really just brightens up your whole day. I just value her as a human, as my sister, but also as a person that's doing the work. Her heart is pure. I just love her.
Ali-Joseph: Thanks, Nikki. Well, I feel the same way. When you find people and connections like this, you don't want to let it go. There's times where we can call each other, text each other and laugh about something, but then there's also times when we say, "I need your help" or "I need feedback." I feel 100% comfortable being in those vulnerable spaces together.
I am grateful that I have another colleague and Indigenous sister here, in the space of academia and athletics, where we can rely on each other and our expertise to come together.
In the spirit of coming together, the two women helped create a forum to create community among Indigenous student-athletes from across the NCAA.
Ali-Joseph: The Native Student-Athlete Summit at the national office has really been a compilation of many years of love, intentionality and bringing the right people together. Dr. Been and myself, along with three other amazing Indigenous people, came together and created the Indigenous Athletics Advancement Council, where we're trying to amplify Indigenous peoples in sports.
We partnered with the amazing inclusion office at the NCAA, and we are coming together to … both create and sustain a space for Native student-athletes. …
Over two days, Native student-athletes and administrators — both Indigenous and non-Indigenous administrators — will be immersed in culturally relevant and applicable educational experiences, reflecting the current situations and futures of our Indigenous and Native student-athletes. The premise is that we want to reflect and project a future that is successful for our Native student-athletes and their communities. Looking at moving beyond marginalized to magnified and centering Native student experiences within these spaces.
Been: Well said, Alisse. I like the fact that she picked out "success." I think often when we think about some of our student-athletes, some of it's not just focusing on their collegiate success athletically and academically, but about their career success, their personal success, too.
One of the goals is to help them to build a community of supporting resources. As we know, our Native American student participation percentages within the NCAA and in Division I through III are pretty low. When we look or talk about the importance of Native American communities, we want to ensure that we're helping them to build a network during the summer so they can have a community that extends beyond their campus while also identifying resources to help them to be successful that they can take back to campus.
This summit has also allowed the two women to reflect on their experiences as former college athletes and as administrators.
Been, a citizen of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation and member of the Thlopthlocco Tribal Town, played basketball at Bacone College. (Photo courtesy of Nicole Been)
Ali-Joseph: It's certainly not about me, it's about our beautiful Indigenous communities. But my love and passion for the research I do is so personal. I carry it with me. I have two beautiful little daughters. I hope we're creating an easier path for them to access college and athletics if they would like to.
I think about my personal experience of participating in college and being one of only two Native student-athletes at the college, and looking around thinking, "Gosh, I'm getting my college paid for. I have all this extra access to academic support. I have to maintain good grades. I have to maintain a healthy lifestyle. I have to move my body. I have to eat well. I have to get sleep."
I looked around and thought, "Why aren't more Native student-athletes being afforded this opportunity?"
That really kick-started my love and passion and my intentionality moving forward through all aspects of my career in grad school. Now, as a faculty member, but I think most importantly, as an Indigenous community member, I am responsible because I have this access to my institution and so I need to help to create more entries for our beautiful Indigenous peoples.
Been: I would agree there. When we talked about personal impact as she mentioned, it's not really about us, but then also in a sense, we do have this overflow of impact that it will have. I'm going to speak for both me and Alisse: There's not a whole bunch of us either, in administration and faculty positions. I think for me when we talk about personal impact, it's also going to build community for me. When our group gets together, it's home. There's like-minded people that understand what I'm talking about from a Native perspective. That's what we want to build for our student-athletes. That community, that connectedness, that support they get from like-minded folks.
Ali-Joseph: Love that. I wouldn't add too much, but I guess I can add about when we think about community, it's not just the community like right here right now, right. It's thinking back on the generations that fought, that survived, that resisted, that loved, that laughed, that shed so many tears and sacrifices for me to be here, for Dr. Been to be here, for all of us to be here.
For Ali-Joseph and Been, the importance of connection and community derive from the values of their Indigenous cultures. These core values have defined their careers as professionals, too.
Been: Just in my professional career, I (value) connecting with others. I enjoy helping others be the best version of themselves and discover their "why." I am thankful for the opportunity to serve in the spaces that I have, not just with the 16 institutions that we serve, but also in our local community. (Another value is) this thing we often refer to as Native or Indigenous humor. It can mean a lot of different things, but I think in this space, it's just not taking yourself too seriously, keeping things light and just enjoying the work and the folks that you work with and/or serve.
Ali-Joseph: Indigenous countries are so small, and I think the love of sports brings it smaller and connects us even more intimately. It's just finding people like Dr. Been and our other council members and allies like Niya (Blair Hackworth) and Sade (Sleet) from the NCAA office of inclusion who have been so amazing and really created a space for us to thrive. It's reiterating that there's a community out there. You might feel small when you look at the data and you see just yourself and one other person, but there's a beautiful community out there ready to love you and embrace you and support you.
Ali-Joseph and Been deeply value their education, with both women holding Ph.D.s.
Been: I don't know about you, Alisse, but education has always been encouraged at a young age.
Ali-Joseph: Yes, it definitely was.
Been: For me, my Ph.D. was really just a tool. It allows me to be at a lot of different seats that would otherwise not be available for me. And those are seats where decisions are made. Education was encouraged, as Alisse mentioned, because through education we pay respect to those — our ancestors, our grandparents — who didn't have the same opportunity.
My grandfather had an eighth-grade education before he went to take care of his siblings. My grandmother had a little bit of experience in high school but eventually dropped out, as well, but ended up getting her GED.
It was important for me to carry that for them, but as Alisse talked about, it's also important for the future generation to know that this is achievable because we don't have a lot of representation there.
Ali-Joseph: I love that. You said it well. I agree 100%.
Along with education, Native American culture is deeply rooted in athletics. Ali-Joseph specializes in the importance of sports and physical activity as a vehicle for empowerment, cultural identity, health and educational attainment for Native American people.
Ali-Joseph, a citizen of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma, played tennis at UC Davis. (Photo courtesy of Alisse Ali-Joseph)
Ali-Joseph: I believe sports have always been a really vibrant and inclusive piece of Indigenous communities. We can't separate it from who we are as people. It's connected to the land, even connected to a lot of our creation and emergent stories, connected to our ceremonies, our languages, and so sport has never been something where you just go out and do it. There's meaning and umph behind it.
When we look at contemporary sports for Indigenous peoples, it definitely carries over to why we participate in sports. As a form of cultural empowerment, a form of educational access, I felt that growing up where I feel like sports has shifted.
My family, we all participated in sports, and we all love sports. We were all college athletes. My grandfather pitched professionally for the White Sox. I know that we carry that from multiple generations before, and I want to be able to provide that for multiple generations ahead.
When we look at participating in sports for Indigenous communities, that encompasses a form of what we call "exercising sovereignty." When we talk about sovereignty, it's usually about governing our people. But I like to move it forward where we're talking about the physical movement of our body to express our political, our cultural, our spiritual citizenship for who we are as Indigenous people. We're not just a racial group; we're a political sovereign nation.
Sports have a really deep connection and meaning to who we are as Native people, so we do carry that with us as Indigenous people. Sport can be a beautiful, beautiful way to connect people across generations, but also connect people from different walks of life that really wouldn't have a lot in common otherwise.
Been: So well said, Alisse. I laugh because me and Alisse could talk all day.
Ali-Joseph: I just am so grateful for Nikki and her love and her friendship and her sisterhood as, as she said about me. Love you, sister.
Been: Love you, too. Yeah, she's stuck with me.
Ali-Joseph: She's stuck with me. … Circling back to the beginning for the Native Student-Athlete Summit. We're really excited about this. This is the first time anything like this is being done, and we've really seen how the Black Student-Athlete Summit has been so successful. Although it'll be a lot smaller, we just pay gratitude to the Black Student-Athlete Summit, as well, for creating that space so we can kind of jump aboard.
And to the Native student-athlete out there: We see you. We love you. We're here for you, and we hope that you can see both Dr. Been and I and other Indigenous and non-Indigenous people as allies and support systems for you. We want you to come to the summit. We are inviting you into the space with love and intentionality to build beautiful, bright futures for our Indigenous youth.
