Brave Heart Fellowship
Champions for Change
CA Native Youth Collective
Remembering Our Sisters
Building Communities of Hope
Creative Native
Democracy is Indigenous
way’ xast sxlxalt kn iskwist
Letkwu (she/they) is a 21-year-old descendant of the Sanpoil, Okanogan, Wenatchi and Moses Columbia Bands of the Colville Confederated Tribes, living in Coulee Dam, WA. They are in the Bachelor of Science Native Environmental Science (BSNES) degree program at Northwest Indian College (NWIC).
Letkwu is a Two-Spirit person who dances fancy shawl at powwows. They are learning the nsyilxcin and nxamaxcin dialects of the Salish languages. In the spring of 2023, they interned for the Native American Agriculture Fund. That same summer, they interned for the Intertribal Agriculture Council (IAC), in partnership with the Natural Resource Conservation Service (NRCS), and the Colville Tribe’s Natural Resource Department (CCT DNR). This year, Letkwu is continuing as a Native Youth Grant Maker (NYG) , a program of Native Americans In Philanthropy (NAP).
About Letkwu’s Project
During their time as a 2024 Brave Heart Fellow, Letwku used Geographic Information Systems (GIS) to create a Story Map of off-reservation state and federal lands available for members and descendants of the Colville Tribes to gather on.
Over the lifecycle of this ongoing project, Letwku hopes to further develop a comprehensive land access guide for other Tribal Nations from the Plateau Region. Their plans also include mapping public and special access guidance for Salish, Ktunaxa and Sahaptin peoples in interior Washington, Montana, Idaho and British Columbia.
