The Southern Ute Education Department chaperoned five Native American students to Washington, D.C. to participate in the annual Close Up: Native American and Alaska Native Youth Summit, which took place Sunday, April 27 through Friday, May 2. Students, Zuriah Baker, Samantha Elk, Leandra Litz, Sonny Flores, and Rayen Muniz spent one week exploring Washington, engaging in workshops with students from different tribal communities, examining the historical relationship between tribes and the U.S. government, and creating Tribal Action Initiatives to address their concerns to tribal leaders, political experts, and policy makers.  

This trip is focused on teaching Native youth how to develop the skills and attitudes to become active citizens within their tribe and communities. During their tour of Washington, D.C., Southern Ute and other Native students interact with students from other tribes creating new friendships as they work to create a “Tribal Action Initiative” poster and presentation – addressing various topics of concerns within tribal communities, later to be presented to tribal leaders, political experts, senators, and policymakers.  

Southern Ute tribal member and Bayfield High School student, Zuriah Baker said “This portion of Close-Up that we are on is for Native American students, and basically [Close-Up] takes Native American students or other students who attend Native schools to the nation’s capitol, Washington D.C., so we can have in-depth version or view of what our government looks like.”   

“Students learn what the government does for us,” Baker said. “Even all the hardships and massacres that have happened–we view the monuments for a reason, and that is to learn what these people have done and what they haven’t done, also what they might have done to our people in the past.”  

Throughout the six-day trip, students worked together to highlight issues pertinent to tribal communities by creating informational poster boards to be presented to tribal leaders, political experts and policy makers. Tribal Action Initiatives focused on topics such as Missing Murdered Indigenous Peoples, introducing focused Indigenous curriculum into public schools, and lowering substance abuse. Outside of work sessions for Tribal Action Initiatives, students also toured the National Mall, focusing on monuments and memorials with historic ties to Native peoples. Tours included viewing the White House, Capitol Hill, World War II, Vietnam, and Korean War Memorials.  

“One of my favorite things about this program is meeting a group of people you’ve never met before, and you’re put to work together and slowly over the time period of this week we all become closer and gain that sense of brotherhood or sisterhood,” Baker said.  

“Personally, I just love coming to D.C., this is where I want to live in the future and history is my true passion, so being here helped me see that every other corner of this city something historic has happened,” she said. “Doing our presentations, we were in a room of the Capitol building where the Watergate readings had happened regarding President Nixon that would later cause him to resign, it is just really interesting to see all of that history in person. One of our Close-Up program chaperones has a political science degree and is working to get a position at Capitol Hill, that inspired me because that is something I would like to get involved in.”  

Samantha Elk, a sophomore at Bayfield High School, shared what Close-Up means to her and her experience attending the trip for the first time. “Close-Up is the opportunity to connect with people that come from a similar background as you and really advocating for the same issues you face and also having those conversations that may be more vulnerable,” Elk said. “With my experience here, I feel like I have grown a lot over the past couple of days–the highlights of my week were connecting with Zuriah [Baker] and Leandra [Litz], and I felt heard, I have gained a sense of advocacy now more than ever and I definitely want to practice that more in my community–I just felt so inspired and connected to this environment.”  

“My highlight for this week was presenting today at Capitol Hill, our focus for this whole week was making our presentations and what we had to look forward to as far as sharing our work with other government officials,” Ignacio High School student, Sonny Flores said, “I have really enjoyed getting to meet with everyone that is on this Close-Up trip and getting to know other Native cultures–quick shout out to all the friends that I have made here, I also want to shout out my mom and my dad, Sunshine and Terence Whyte. I have had their full support going on this trip, they knew it was going to be hard letting me travel by myself here, but they helped me to maintain school and helped prepare me to take this journey–I am really thankful for them.” 

Leandra Litz is a Southern Ute tribal member and student at Ignacio High School, in reflecting on this trip to the Capital she said, “Understanding how everyone is different, they come from different tribes throughout Indian Country and yet we get to talk about issues from back home and know that they are almost similar and we are all similar as people, that was my favorite part.”  

“I have really enjoyed making new friends on this trip,” Litz said. “I would like to thank my Muan (father) Leondro Litz and my Piyan (mother) Alyssa Nez also my grandmas because they all took part in helping me prep for this trip, they all encouraged me to be here, and I am very thankful. I would also like to thank our chaperones Dustin, Kaylyn, and ShaRay they are all so goofy and silly, but they have made this trip so much fun, and I am thankful they gave us the opportunity to be [in Washington, D.C.]; I love them so much.” 

Rayen Muniz attends Big Picture High School in Durango, Colo. He extends his encouragement to try new things and shares his thanks to those who helped make this trip possible. “To me Close-Up is getting to be more interactive with new people that you may have never had the opportunity to meet before,” Muniz said. “I would like to thank my dad for telling me about this chance to travel to D.C., also [Dustin Weaver, ShaRay Rock, and Kaylyn LeClaire] and the students that I came with, they are all so nice and so welcoming–they all helped me to try something new and not be scared, if you want to try something new … just go for it.” 

“I would like to thank my mom and stepdad, Hailey and Zachary Yesslith, also my grandma,” Zuriah Baker said. “I would also like to thank our beautiful chaperones; Dustin always has my back, Kaylyn always has me smiling and I love her auntie laugh, ShaRay just makes me so happy and she’s like another mom to me, ShaRay cares about all of us so much.”  

Local Native students and other students throughout Indian Country came together to make long lasting connections with the people and places that represent our democracy, Close-Up’s once in a lifetime program opportunities are designed to inspire and empower students to become active participants and voices in the democratic process. With the help of program instructors and the Southern Ute Education Department, these students had opportunity to gain a hands-on experience with history and government, consider a variety of viewpoints on current Native issues, and build the skills of an engaged citizen who wants to make a change, advocating for people throughout Indian Country.