My honey's AITTP Graduation Dinner

AITTP stands for American Indian Teacher Training Program. The dinner this year was The Point Restaurant by the Huntsman Cancer Institute. The view was honestly breathtaking. You could see all the way down to Draper, out to the Salt Lake and everything in between. GORGEOUS!There was a nice little program planned out for the evening. They even brought in a drum group. Michele said that they sang Ponca songs, which is pretty neat.

Bryan Brayboy (the one in the picture with Jason) was the one that wrote the grant for the AITTP program in the first place. Bryan has been a great mentor to Jason and helped him a lot. Bryan stood up and said something about each of the student's graduating. This is what he said about Jason, "Jason is the first person in this cohort that I met. I knew him before the AITTP even existed. He is the father of 4 and very grounded in his identity as an indigenous man. He is also committed to helping indigenous students. He reminds me of people where I come from. His warmth will be comforting to his students."

He spoke and gave us some interesting facts. He said that each person graduating tomorrow from the AITTP programs represents over 20,000 Indians who will never go on to pursue post high school education. Pretty sad, but at the same time so amazing that so many Indians are graduating this year. He also said they will be making history tomorrow. They will graduate 8 masters students tomorrow, and that is more than the past 70 years put together! Pretty incredible.

Then Gwen got up and was saying that the AITTP program really is making a difference, because the first Indian mentor she had in school was Bryan when she started this program at the age of 29. But because of this program, someone who graduated from the AITTP program last year is now teaching her son's preschool class. So her son is getting an Indian mentor at the age of 4 instead of 29. Pretty impressive!

They had all of the graduates get up and speak for just a minute. As soon as Jason stood up, he got choked up, so of course I just had tears streaming down my face. He thanked Bryan and Gwen and others who helped him. He said he couldn't have made it without, "my beautiful wife." It's a good thing he said that or I might have had to beat him!

He also thanked his mom and Steven for being there. It really was great. I am so glad that all of us could be there together to celebrate with him. I am so proud of Jason and all of his hard work and getting to this point.

They gave everyone an AITTP sash to wear during graduation, a beaded feather to wear on their caps, and a super nice and expensive Indian blanket. It was an amazing evening, and I couldn't be prouder of my honey.