A Few Things I Learned at the Spirit Lake Children’s Service Symposium

By Allison Carlson, Special Projects Coordinator

The two day symposium started out with a powerful drum group performance by Rhythm Riders/Darrell Three Irons with presentation of the flags. It was a spiritual experience for me and showed how much pride the people of Spirit Lake have for their nation’s colors and the flag of the United States. 

Then the U.S. Marshal’s Office presented a coloring book they composed with Cankdeska Cikana Community College. The title of the coloring book is “Star Woman Marshal and the Law,” and it will be distributed throughout the different programs at Spirit Lake.

The symposium included a presentation to the community of the results of third party assessments completed on a variety of tribal programs serving children. The symposium concluded with 25 or more groups coming together and making a commitment to be a part of making Spirit Lake a better place for children. The group consists of federal, state, and nonprofit agencies.

During the symposium, Ethleen Iron Cloud-Two Dogs, of the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, shared with us the meaning behind each of the polls for a tipi and how it is assembled. I never knew what the true meaning behind the tipi was until then. There are a couple of things that stand out for me about her teaching – that the door always faces to the east and the first three polls to be put up are stars that you pray to. She taught me that everything traditionally Native American has a meaning behind it, so now when I see someone presenting or doing something for their tribe I’m going to wonder what the meaning behind it is. 

Ethleen Iron Cloud-Two Dogs

I would like to end with a quote that Ethleen Iron Cloud-Two Dogs sighted from another conference she was at in the early 1990s:

“The Psychologist, Dr. John Briere, remarked that, if child abuse and neglect were to disappear today, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual would shrink to the size of a pamphlet in two generations, and the prisons would empty.”

Allison Carlson is Special Projects Coordinator for Prevent Child Abuse North Dakota and is currently coordinating an Early Childhood Summit with Dr. Andrew Garner of the American Academy of Pediatrics. The Spirit Lake Children's Services Symposium took place in late September and was sponsored by Spirit Lake Tribe and Cankdeska Cikana Community College, with co-sponsorship from PCAND and the North Dakota Maternal, Infant, Early Childhood Home Visitation Project.