Planning: CRISES: Center for Indigenous Knowledge and Stewardship (CIKS)

Addressing national and global crises taking place at the intersection of society and environmental relations requires innovation and transformative approaches. Current approaches from US research have focused exclusively on western scientific disciplines – what is missing is the breadth and depth of Indigenous knowledge systems. This planning grant convenes a group of university researchers (Indigenous and non-Indigenous scientists) and Tribal leaders and partners to generate a new vision of how universities and Tribal Nations can work together to develop new research protocols and projects to address the social and environmental crises facing not just Tribes, but all communities all across our nation. This Indigenous-led convening uplifts Tribal leadership together with western science expertise to collaboratively vision and co-develop a proposal for the Center for Indigenous Knowledge and Stewardship (CIKS). As Indigenous scholars, social scientists, natural scientists, and Tribal leaders, our team has worked across cultural and disciplinary boundaries over years of collaboration to build relationships and trust necessary to advance the goals of this work in effective and culturally appropriate ways. Our evidence-based approach to transforming research processes includes an elevation of Indigenous epistemologies and ontologies, Indigenous rights and values, Indigenous knowledge, language, stories, protocols, and practices. The Center for Indigenous Knowledge and Stewardship generates a new vision of how universities and Tribes can work together to address the social and environmental crises of our time. There is a growing need for scientists trained in knowledge co-production and for inclusive science to correct the systematic exclusion of Indigenous peoples and knowledge systems from conventional western science research approaches. Our convening and collaboration to co-develop a full proposal for CIKS will itself generate and advance scholarship on knowledge co-production and expand environmental sciences and governance processes to better include western social sciences, Indigenous knowledge systems, and One Health frameworks. CIKS would be a national model for training and research that bridges Indigenous and western sciences to address seemingly intractable social-environmental crises. CIKS’s focus on addressing critical crises facing Indigenous and all communities across the nation will improve health and wellbeing of people and environments. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.