Leo Bird Jr. wins $6,500 Milken grant, goal to teach lodge building to students

September 7, 2007

Browning High School teacher Leo Bird Jr. has been awarded a $6,500 community service grant from the Milken Festival for Youth program to be used to assist the high school students in learning the time-honored tradition of designing and constructing the Blackfeet Tribe's central dwelling unit, the lodge (or teepee) from the two remaining elders able to pass down the oral instructions.

Through a hands-on process in which the students will actually construct five different lodges, they will come to understand that their ancestors were home economists, mathematicians and scientists. The lodges will become an integral part of a new cultural interpretative center. This intergenerational project will strengthen the youth's appreciation for the wisdom of their elders and their rich ancestral history.

By John McGill

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