Native American week, organized by Jlynn Joseph, from Native American descent, Mr. Jesse McFeron, and the students of the Diversity Club, opened many eyes to the realities facing Native Americans both historically and today.

All throughout the school informational posters gave the community the historical context. On the steps of the main staircase were posted the names of the different tribes from around the Washington area, among them Puyallup, Duwamish, Snoqualmie, Upper Skagit, and Samish.

There is a large poster hanging main stairs which says  “water is life” talking about how for Native Americans, everything is based around water and how we need to keep it clean. The sign also has the hashtag NoDAPL, which is talking about the Dakota Access Pipeline and how the government should not have accesses to it because it would disrupt the Standing Rock Tribe, which is another hashtag on the sign, in North and South Dakota ancient burial grounds. These hashtags are used to spread awareness of the important issue that is currently taking place.

Everyday there were morning reflections from Jlynn Joseph, Paloma Vasquez, Mr. McFeron and Mia Heffernan. These reflections were used to help spread awareness about the week and discuss prevalent issues that Native Americans face on a day to day basis, including racial inequality they experience such as police brutality when protesting the Dakota Access Pipeline.

On thursday after school in room 205 Joseph and McFeron showed Dream Keeper,a movie about a teenage boy whose grandfather tells him stories about his tribe and that he should embrace where he comes from and be proud of it. Senior Jlynn said she chose this movie because it has an important message and she grew up watching it.

On friday, to end Native American week there was a moving assembly where Joseph was able to show her family’s culture. In the assembly, Joseph showed a video about why nature and clean water is so important to their culture. Joseph brought about thirteen people from her Lummi Youth Canoe Family to the assembly to talk about how they got involved with the organization and give Blanchet an insight of what the culture is about. The Lummi Youth Canoe Family also gave preformed two impressive dances and songs. At the very end of the assembly Joseph’s father got up to introduce himself and say that he is thankful that people accept his daughter at school and that he was able to come to the school and show some of the issues that the Native American people face on a day to day basis.