For years Jim Leatham wondered why he looked at the world and behaved in ways that were so different from other people. It’s not as though Leatham wasn’t flourishing. He obtained an undergraduate mechanical engineering degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a master’s degree in electrical engineering/electrophysics from the University of Southern California. 

Mdison Whitekiller became a “nurse” at the age of 10. Her mother had been diagnosed with breast cancer, and Whitekiller took care of her as best she could. Looking back, Whitekiller believes this experience greatly influenced her desire to pursue medicine. Now, as she starts medical school at the University of Oklahoma–Tulsa School of Community Medicine, she is well on her way to becoming a doctor and helping not only her mother but the larger Native community.

Whether graduation is around the corner or in your rearview mirror, you may find yourself wondering what’s next. Some students know which path they are taking before they graduate. For others, the path isn’t as clear. The good news is that there are many different paths and no wrong answer, only the path that works for you. But how do you figure out which path to take? Here are a few ways to help you decide which path makes the most sense for you.
 
Define Your Passion

Whether you’ve been on campus for a month or years, it’s probably safe to say that you’ve met a diverse group of people. Not only may these people be of different races, genders, and ages, they may also have varying political views. Politics can be a difficult area of discussion, but healthy, productive conversations are possible. Here are a few ways to navigate politics and the current social climate on campus.

When Leona Anderson was a young girl in Los Angeles, she knew she was part Native American, as her father always told her this. Her father was born and raised in Broken Arrow, Okla., and he would visit his hometown for a month each summer and visit the Cherokee Nation in Bixby, Okla., to spend time with his sister. Her father’s visit was about reconnecting with his sister, but it was also about providing her with much needed assistance. “My dad would help her with projects around her house and garden,” says Anderson, this year’s winner of the Blazing Flame Award.

Mariah Gladstone has found a recipe for success in her online cooking show Indigikitchen. Its name blends the words “Indigenous,” “digital,” and “kitchen,” and her weekly recipes, tips, and social media videos aim to reIndigenize the diets of Native Americans while tempting all viewers to opt for healthier diets. Her Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube posts have won her thousands of followers and interest from book agents and publishers.

Luke Schrimsher is using alignment lasers to build an optical X-ray system. “That’s the fun part of the job,” he says. A citizen of the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma, Schrimsher works as an engineering technical associate in the Nondestructive Evaluation Group at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, Calif. 

He may have been raised in the city, but Dr. Clint Carroll has always felt most at home in the woods. From Texas to Arkansas, and Oklahoma to Colorado, Dr. Carroll’s love of the land developed at a young age. Now an associate professor at the University of Colorado Boulder, Dr. Carroll, Cherokee Nation, uses his knowledge of the land to address tribal environmental issues.

Cherokee, N.C., is known for one thing: Harrah’s Casino. As a young girl growing up in its shadow, I knew that a career tied to Harrah’s wasn’t in my future. Instead, my interests lay in finance and art. But it wasn’t until I attended Arizona State University that I under-
stood how to combine the two. Now, as an MBA candidate at the Fashion Institute of Design and Merchandising in Los Angeles, I’m well on my way to realizing my dreams by combining my financial skills with my love of art.

All the companies on the Winds of Change Top 50 Workplaces for Indigenous STEM Professionals list are strong supporters of diversity. But what are these workplaces doing that sets them apart? Here, we’ve taken a closer look at three of these employers to highlight some of the ways they foster an inclusive climate at work and the initiatives they have put in place to support individual staff members.