Native American Grads: Get Ready to Rock Your Grad Walk Mocs!

Native Forward Scholars Fund Hosts a Virtual Graduation Regalia Walk to Celebrate Native Cultures, Communities, and Achievements

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M., March 28, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- Many colleges and universities are cancelling Indigenous graduations this spring in response to political pressure. But national Native scholarships providers know our students' cultures are their strength. Creating vibrant Tribal regalia is a centuries-long tradition. Families, friends, and entire communities demonstrate their love by creating regalia for an honored relative to wear, demonstrating cultural ties while celebrating the hopes and dreams our ancestors and kin hold for the future—a Native person's wealth. By wearing this demonstration of community respect, an honored tribal member walks confidently into the future. To celebrate Native students and their achievements, Native Forward Scholars Fund, with the American Indian College Fund, the American Indian Science and Engineering Society, and Cobell Scholarships, is hosting an online graduation walk on social media for students to share photos and videos as they rock their mocs, their ribbon skirts, their ribbon shirts, their beadwork, their unique jewelry combinations, their headpieces—and everything that makes their graduation unique as Native people.

We invite all winter and spring Native graduates to post photographs of their regalia from creative inception to completion on Native Forward social media channels. Please share photos of your designs on paper, your fabrics, feathers, and beads, and your regalia coming together, stitch by stitch. Post photos of you proudly rocking your mocs and your graduation regalia with your family to show Native students are here, we achieve, and we are fulfilling our dreams and the dreams of our ancestors. Share your photos and posts on Native Forward's Instagram and Facebook accounts (@NativeForward). Native Forward will also host a virtual graduation ceremony for Native students on our social media channels. Look for your opportunity to register for this event on our social media channels.

Tribal college presidents, faculty, staff, and other recent graduates are encouraged to show your support and post your throwback graduation regalia photos as we celebrate our students, our cultures, and our communities together!

Mariah Plummer (Navajo Nation, Diné), Program Administrator of Student Engagement and Communications at the American Indian College Fund who works to support Native scholars, said, "Our regalia and traditional outfits are our wealth. They are stitched with love, hand-crafted from generations of creativity, and threaded with wisdom from our ancestors. We carry all that with us, it becomes part of our wisdom, and it is something we look forward to passing on to future generations."

About Native Forward:

Native Forward Scholars Fund is the largest direct provider of scholarships to Native students for greater economic mobility, self-determination, and Tribal sovereignty for scholars and Tribal communities. The organization is committed to ensuring that every Native student who wants to pursue higher education has the resources to do so. Over 55 years, it has empowered over 22,000 scholars from more than 500 Tribes in all 50 states and contributed to over 1,700 law degrees and more than 2,200 PhD degrees. By pairing scholarships with meaningful, culturally relevant student support and programming, Native Forward has succeeded in increasing the graduation rates of undergraduate students to 69%, compared to the national average of 41% for Native students, and has boosted the rate for graduate students to 95%.

Contact: Jacqueline Lee Rivera
[email protected] 

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SOURCE Native Forward Scholars Fund