In this talk, Rose High Bear (Deg Hit’an Dine, Inupiaq), Founding Director of the Native American nonprofit, Elderberry Wisdom Farm, will share her experience integrating Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK) into their experiential service-learning activities and discuss how they provide it to Native American and other interns of color pursuing conservation career pathways.

Positive collaborative partnerships are as important to Elderberry Wisdom Farm’s growth and sustainability as the culturally tailored learning model and TEK Internships their team has developed. Much of this success is attributed to EWF’s race reconciliation model and its focus on positive diplomacy. Rose’s partnerships began six years ago with Marion Soil and Water Conservation District and Chemeketa Community College and has expanded to include North Santiam and Pudding River Watershed Councils, Institute for Applied Ecology and its Willamette Valley Native Plant Partnership, Oregon Tilth with its TOPP program, several Oregon tribes, local organic farms, and more recently the City of Salem Urban Forestry and the Oregon Department of Forestry: Urban Forestry.

More information is available at www.elderberrywisdom.org.