2025 Luce Indigenous Knowledge Fellowship Advisory Committee
Gimiwan Dustin Burnette (Leech Lake Band of Ojibwe) is an Ojibwe language immersion educator and nonprofit entrepreneur committed to revitalizing the Ojibwe language. Since 2009, Gimiwan Dustin has worked at several Ojibwe language immersion schools across Minnesota and Wisconsin. He is the founder of the Midwest Indigenous Immersion Network (MIIN), a community-based organization that promotes collaboration and curriculum development among Ojibwe educators. This network allows Ojibwe language instructors and administrators to share resources.
Karl Duncan (Mandan, Hidatsa, Arikara, San Carlos Apache) is the executive director for the Poeh Cultural Center at the Pueblo of Pojoaque. A graduate of the Institute of American Indian Arts, Karl received a BA in Museum Studies and is currently part of the first cohort for the MFA program in Cultural Administration at IAIA. He has worked as the curator for the Buffalo Thunder Resort Art Collection, serves as vice-president of the Continuous Pathways Foundation and as a board member of Buffalo Thunder Incorporated and Silver Bullet Productions.
Sarah Hernandez (Sicangu Lakota) is an assistant professor of Native American Literature and the director of the Institute for American Indian Research at the University of New Mexico. She is a member of the Oak Lake Writers Society, an Oceti Sakowin-led nonprofit for Dakota, Nakota, and Lakota writers. Together they launched #NativeReads, a community-based reading campaign and podcast series that seeks to increase knowledge and appreciation of the Oceti Sakowin literary tradition. Sarah is also the author of We Are the Stars: Colonizing and Decolonizing the Oceti Sakowin Literary Tradition, a literary study that recovers the literary work of Dakota women and furthers discussions on settler colonialism, literature, nationalism, and gender.
Charles Aulii Mitchell (Native Hawaiian) is a third-generation Kumu Hula of Hula Ki’i , a dance that was passed down to him through oral tradition by his grandfather Charles Cash and his mother Harriet Aana Cash Mitchell. By the time he was 12 years old, Charles earned the title of a Kumu Hula and was considered a kumu level hula teacher and knowledge keeper under his mother. He is one of only three family tradition holders of Hula Ki’i. What’s more, he is committed to creating, preserving, and perpetuating the practice of carving and dressing images for the ritual dancing of Hula Ki’i closest to the oldest written accounts. Charles earned an associate degree and bachelor’s degree in anthropology from the University of Hawai’i at Hilo, and a master’s in applied Indigenous knowledge from the Te Wānanga o Aotearoa in New Zealand, as their first international student.
Jessica R. Metcalfe, PhD, (Turtle Mountain Chippewa) is a graduate of Dartmouth College and the University of Arizona who wrote her doctoral dissertation on Native designers of high fashion. She is the owner of Beyond Buckskin, which is based out of the Turtle Mountain Indian Reservation in Belcourt, North Dakota. The Beyond Buckskin Boutique sells Native American-made couture, streetwear, jewelry, and accessories, and the Beyond Buckskin website focuses on Native fashion, including contemporary design, historical adornment, and issues related to cultural appropriation in the fashion industry. Dr. Metcalfe has taught courses in American Indian studies, studio art, art history, and literature at tribal colleges and state universities. She has presented at numerous national conferences, lectured at museums, and co-curated exhibitions. Her current work focuses on Native American art, clothing, and design from all time periods, with an emphasis on contemporary artists.
Raymond Foxworth (Navajo) (Advisor to Committee) joined the Foundation in April 2023 as the Foundation’s inaugural program director for the Indigenous Knowledge Initiative. Prior to joining the Foundation, Raymond served as vice president for First Nations Development Institute, a national Native-led organization that works with Native American communities on community and economic development.
Raymond holds a PhD in political science from the University of Colorado at Boulder and has an extensive research background focused on Indigenous politics, democracy and social development in the U.S. and Latin America. In 2021-2022 he served as a visiting scholar in the political science department at the University of New Mexico. He currently serves on the board of directors for the Native Arts and Cultures Foundation and the American Political Science Association. He is a former board member of the Women’s Foundation of Colorado and Native Public Media.
Michael Roberts (Tlingit) is the president and CEO of First Nations Development Institute, a position he was appointed to in 2005 after having served as a research officer and chief operating officer for the organization from 1992 to 1997 and returning to First Nations in 2002. In the interim, Mike spent five years in private equity, during which he advised angel investors and worked for a $500 million telecommunications fund and for an early-stage Midwest venture capital firm. Mike also worked at Alaska Native corporations and for local IRA councils, primarily in accounting and finance. Mike serves on the board of First Nations Development Institute and is chairman of the board of First Nations Oweesta Corporation. He is on the Steering Committee of the Sustainable Agriculture and Food Systems Funders Network and the Investment Committee for the Three Affiliated Tribes. Mike also serves on the board of directors for Native Ways Federation. Read Mike’s full bio here.
Catherine Bryan (Navajo) is a member of the Navajo Nation and provides strategic leadership, management, and direction for First Nations’ administration, communications, and the Native Arts, Language and Knowledge program. Catherine joined First Nations as a program officer in 2008, then served as a senior program officer, became a director of programs in 2017 and has been Vice President of Grantmaking, Communications, Administration, and Native Arts, Language and Knowledge program. Prior to joining First Nations, from 2004 to 2008, Catherine was a legal analyst for the National Tribal Justice Resource Center, a program of the National American Indian Court Judges Association that convenes and provides technical assistance for tribal court judges and judicial systems across Indian Country. Catherine holds a J.D. degree from the University of New Mexico – School of Law. In her former life, she attained Master of Arts and Bachelor of Arts degrees in French literature from the University of Oklahoma, lived in France on and off for several years, and taught lower-level French university courses.