Jordan Sahly has lost track of the number of baking soda volcanoes he made in his driveway as a child. But he hasn’t lost his passion for the sciences, chemistry in particular. After honing his interest in science, Sahly set his sights on chemical engineering and hasn’t looked back. Now a senior at Yale University, Sahly is well on his way to becoming a chemical engineer with the goal of helping Native communities combat energy and climate crises and limit harm to the land.
Growing up in Maple Grove, Minn., a small suburb about 30 minutes outside Minneapolis, Sahly had plenty of opportunities to connect with the land. “Whenever I had breaks from school, I would find myself either in the north woods of Minnesota swimming in lakes and exploring pine forests or traveling back to the homelands in Wyoming,” explains Sahly.
With his father’s family in Minnesota and his mother’s family in Wyoming, Sahly experienced both suburban and more rural sides of life. In Wyoming he learned about, and became interested in, his Native heritage. “My maternal grandfather was raised back in the homelands and has always had a strong connection to the people, animals, and lands that our tribe holds sacred,” explains Sahly. “He is one of the largest influences on my journey.”
Sahly has also been influenced by the hard work and determination of his parents, whom he watched work long, hard hours to provide for their family. “From a young age, my parents’ only goal for me was college,” says Sahly. “They wanted for me what they could not have for themselves.”
As much as Sahly tried to make the most of his time at Maple Grove Senior High School, as one of only a handful of Native students in the school, and with little connection to his tribe back in Wyoming, Sahly felt unsupported. “It was an environment not well suited to creating success for Native students,” he says.
Fortunately, this lack of support did not stop Sahly from applying to colleges, even though as a first-generation student he had little idea of what his next steps should be. “It was difficult to visualize what colleges I could or should attend and how to get there,” explains Sahly. “I ended up applying to a range of schools as I really was not prepared for the college application process at all.” Sahly clearly did something right, as he was accepted at an Ivy League school, Yale University in New Haven, Conn.
While he was excited to pursue a college degree, Sahly was unprepared for the transition to campus, especially in light of the pandemic. “As part of the original high school senior–college freshman class affected by the pandemic, I began my college career thousands of miles from home without my family even helping me to move in,” notes Sahly. “We then experienced a year of lockdown and isolation; this was a huge challenge for me.” After being sent home from Yale and required to complete his spring semester remotely, Sahly turned to an unlikely source for comfort: beadwork.
Beading is a big part of his family’s heritage, but Sahly had no prior experience with the art, and little artistic skill. “I am not a natural artist,” he says. “Stick figures were about the height of my skills!” Sahly spent hours each day teaching himself to weave, stitch, and thread, and grew his skill to the point where he now sells beadwork (@blueshadesbeadwork) to help cover college expenses. “Beadwork gave me the strength to persevere through those many months where I felt lost,” he explains.
Once back on campus, Sahly needed to get reaccustomed to the college culture and community. The Native community had been isolated due to the pandemic, so it took him longer than expected to connect with other Native students. He also wasn’t as prepared academically, struggling in math and science courses.
Although acclimating was difficult, Sahly soon found elements of the Yale community that resonated with him, and he became involved in groups and organizations across campus. “I maintained my love for music by joining the Yale Concert and Jazz Bands, as well as the Davenport Pops Orchestra,” notes Sahly. But he didn’t stop there. “I joined my first research lab as a sophomore, and this year I joined a new lab research group where I help analyze urban wastewater for COVID, monkeypox, and other viral pathogens.” In addition to his scientific extracurriculars, Sahly has also become heavily involved in Native and Indigenous groups on campus, including the Native and Indigenous Students Association at Yale, Red Territory (Yale’s intertribal drum group), Yale’s Native American Cultural Center, and Yale's AISES College Chapter, for which he was elected and serves as co-president. He also serves as a peer liaison for the NACC, helping younger Native students adjust to college life.
Once Sahly began to feel like a part of the Yale community, his goals and dreams became clearer. While he had always loved chemistry, Sahly’s time at Yale has helped him understand how to hone that interest. “I transitioned into chemical engineering because it’s far more versatile, it offers more skills to explore with, and it is more useful for my communities,” he explains. “Particularly as we face energy and climate crises, engineers in practice will be able to effect change in a hands-on way.”
Now Sahly is truly enjoying his time at Yale, and is excited to see where his path takes him. “My ultimate goal would be to be an engineer who helps consult on ways to make our industry more inclusive, sustainable, and impactful,” says Sahly. “Engineering has not always been kind to our Indigenous communities, and I would love to have the option to fight within the industry for our communities.”
Sahly believes that his ability to find perspective and create community has been important to his journey, and he encourages others to stay true to themselves and their stories. “Identify the why,” he says. “What will drive you to find success? What do you want to learn?” Sahly believes asking yourself questions like these can help you understand yourself, and where you want your journey to take you. Don’t worry about having it all figured out. As he says, “I don’t believe in forcing a journey. I’m sure I will end up where I’m needed most.”
