As a PhD candidate at the University of Arkansas and SREB Doctoral Fellow, my passion for tribal sovereignty, public policy, and the federal-tribal relationship stems from my Cherokee and Choctaw heritage. For eight years I’ve enjoyed a variety of experiences working for the National Park Service as a Pathways Career Intern and serving as President of the Arkansas Chapter of the Trail of Tears including historic and anthropological research, ethnographic and oral history projects, collaborative outreach activities engaging native youth, cultural resource management, and federal/tribal government-to-government consultation.