Wakinyan LaPointe is a Sicangu (Burnt Thigh) Lakota citizen of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe. Mr. LaPointe will begin his tenure as an American Studies Ph.D. student at the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities with a Master of Nonprofit Management from Hamline University and a B.A. of Political Science from the UMN. His research interests include Indigenous human rights and the right to water; treaty rights and federal-Indian law; Indigenous knowledge systems; political-economic development; and Indigenous organizational models designed to advance these fields.