University of Wisconsin - Extension

Tony Fairbanks has been selected as the first Native American Youth Development Specialist with University of Wisconsin-Extension and UW-Superior. Fairbanks will be a statewide resource on Native American youth needs and effective programming strategies for Native American youth in Wisconsin.

"This is a new and critical position for UW-Extension 4-H Youth Development and UW-Superior," said Greg Hutchins, 4-H youth development program leader at UW-Extension. "Tony will be a resource to UW faculty and staff in First Nations Studies Program at UW-Superior, and to Cooperative Extension faculty and staff who work with Native American communities around the state. He'll also work to link Native American families with UW resources."

Hutchins said Fairbanks will lead recruitment efforts and provide ongoing support services to current and potential American Indian students. He also will develop culturally appropriate educational programs and curriculum for Cooperative Extension's 4-H Youth Development program.

Chip Beal, multicultural affairs coordinator at UW-Superior, said traditional recruitment strategies miss many potential Native American students.

"We want to make connections with kids and their families from grade school on, in an effort to "talk college" with them," Beal said. "We want them to be talking about UW-Superior and college in general at the dinner table and other family gatherings as well as at powwows and similar tribal gatherings. We will not only connect these culturally sensitive contacts to UW-Extension activities and 4-H clubs, but use them to develop Native American culturally sensitive pre-college programs at UW-Superior."

UW-Extension's 4-H Youth Development Program has helped to organize 4-H clubs and other youth programs in Native American communities and hopes to expand these programs. UW-Superior, which currently enrolls 50 Native American students, representing 2.2 percent of the student body, hopes to increase that enrollment. Ten Native American reservations are located within a 100-mile radius of UW-Superior.

Fairbanks will work from the UW-Superior campus. This position is a result of collaboration between the University of Wisconsin-Superior and the University of Wisconsin-Extension.

Fairbanks previously served as a consultant to the Blandin Foundation and as Dean of Students of the Fond du Lac Ojibewe School. He was the first Native American principal of the St. Mary's Mission School at the Red Lake Band of Chippewa Indian Reservation, executive director of the American Heart Association for Alaska and Montana and a consultant to educational, tribal and government organizations for educational and human resource programming.