CO-FOUNDER, DIRECTOR DATA WARRIORS LAB

Dr. Desi Small-Rodriguez is a citizen of the Northern Cheyenne Nation and Chicana. She is the Executive Director of the Data Warriors Lab, a mobile Indigenous data science laboratory that partners with tribal nations and Indigenous communities to rebuild data for strong self-determined Indigenous futures. She co-founded the U.S. Indigenous Data Sovereignty Network and is a founding member of the Global Indigenous Data Alliance. Dr. Desi is also an assistant professor at the University of California, Los Angeles. As a social demographer and Indigenous statistician, her research and praxis center on disrupting settler colonial systems and rebuilding data by Indigenous Peoples for Indigenous Peoples.

CO-FOUNDER, DIRECTOR COLLABORATORY FOR INDIGENOUS DATA GOVERNANCE

Dr. Stephanie Carroll is a citizen of the Native Village of Kluti-Kaah in Alaska and of Sicilian-descent. She directs the Collaboratory for Indigenous Data Governance, a research network that develops research, policy, and practice innovations for Indigenous Data Sovereignty. Her research, teaching, and engagement seek to transform institutional governance and ethics for Indigenous control of Indigenous data, particularly within open science, open data, and big data contexts. Stephanie co-edited the book Indigenous Data Sovereignty and Policy and co-led the publication of the CARE Principles for Indigenous Data Governance. Stephanie co-founded the US Indigenous Data Sovereignty Network and co-founded and chairs the Global Indigenous Data Alliance (GIDA) and the Indigenous Data Working Group for the IEEE P2890 Recommended Practice for Provenance of Indigenous Peoples' Data.

CO-FOUNDER, DIRECTOR US INDIGENOUS DATA SOVEREIGNTY NETWORK

Dr. Riley Taitingfong is a Chamoru researcher and educator working on issues of environmental justice, Indigenous self-determination, emerging technologies, and community engagement. She completed her PhD in Communication at the University of California San Diego, where her project focused on Indigenous governance of genetic engineering technologies known as gene drives. Riley is currently a postdoctoral researcher with Udall and the Native Nations Institute, working on the implementation of CARE Principles of Indigenous Data Governance within data repositories. As a Chamoru researcher, Riley is committed to building cross-movement solidarity among Indigenous communities from Oceania to Turtle Island.

CO-FOUNDER

Director Project on Indigenous Governance and Development, Harvard

Randall Akee was a Professor at the University of California, Los Angeles in the Department of Public Policy and American Indian Studies. At UCLA he served as the Chair of the American Indian Studies Department. He completed his Ph.D. at Harvard University in June 2006. Prior to his doctoral studies, Dr. Akee earned a Master’s degree in International and Development Economics at Yale University. He also spent several years working for the State of Hawaii Office of Hawaiian Affairs Economic Development Division.

Dr. Akee is a faculty research fellow at the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) in Labor Studies and the Children’s Groups. He is also a non-resident fellow at the Brookings Institution in Economic Studies and at the Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA), a faculty affiliate at the UCLA California Center for Population Research (CCPR) at UCLA and a faculty affiliate at UC Berkelely Center for Effective Global Action (CEGA). His main research interests are Labor Economics, Economic Development and Migration.

Previous research has focused on the determinants of migration and human trafficking, the effect of changes in household income on educational attainment, the effect of political institutions on economic development and the role of property institutions on investment decisions. Current research focuses on income inequality and immobility by race and ethnicity in the US. Dr. Akee has worked on several American Indian reservations, Canadian First Nations, and Pacific Island nations in addition to working in various Native Hawaiian communities.

From August 2006 until August 2009 he was a Research Associate at IZA, where he also served as Deputy Program Director for Employment and Development. Prior to UCLA (2009-2012), he was an Assistant Professor at Tufts University and spent AY 2011-2012 at the Center for Labor Economics at University of California, Berkeley.

In June 2013 he was named to the U.S. Census Bureau’s National Advisory Committee on Racial, Ethnic and Other Populations.

CO-FOUNDER

Director, Indigenous Land & Data Stewards Lab

Dr. David-Chavez is Director of the Indigenous Land & Data Stewards Lab, and Assistant Professor of Indigenous Natural Resource Stewardship at Colorado State University’s Forest and Rangeland Stewardship Department, working in partnership with the Collaboratory for Indigenous Data Governance. She draws from her experiences as a multicultural Caribbean Indigenous (Arawak Taíno) community member, research scientist, educator, and learner in her scholarship and practice. In doing so, she holds an intergenerational commitment towards supporting culturally grounded community members as researchers and science leaders, restoring pathways for knowledge regeneration with the original stewards of Indigenous knowledge systems and the lands, waters, lifeways and languages within which they are embedded.

CO-FOUNDER

Director, Indigenous Organizations and Data Lab

Cheryl Ellenwood (she/her) is a citizen of the Nez Perce Nation and also Navajo. She is an Assistant Professor at Washington State University. Her research examines issues of equity and justice in the public and nonprofit sectors. She has worked with Native-led organizations and advocates for solutions led by Indigenous organizations and an Indigenous Data Sovereignty framework. Her current research partnership with the Nez Perce is a political and cultural history of the Nez Perce Fisheries’ transfer of authority to full management of two fish hatcheries. It argues that their success in salmon recovery is informed by cultural knowledge and a commitment to stewarding life sources. Cheryl holds a PhD in Public Management from the University of Arizona and a MA in American Indian Studies from the University of California, Los Angeles. She is also the Director of the Indigenous Organizations and Data Lab, a member of the IndigeLab Network, and an alum and collaborator of the Collaboratory for Indigenous Data Governance.

CO-FOUNDER

Dr. Ibrahim Garba (Karai-Karai), MA, JD, SJD, is Assistant Research Professor (Mel and Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health) and Senior Researcher (Native Nations Institute) at the University of Arizona. He has graduate training in philosophy and international human rights law. He has also completed fellowships in bioethics and health policy. His legal scholarship has explored the evolution of collective rights in international law. His current research assesses the capacity of international human rights law to provide an ethics framework for the governance of data from Indigenous Peoples for research and other uses.

CO-FOUNDER

Director, Sovereign Soils Research Collaborative

Dr. Lydia Jennings (she/her) is an environmental soil scientist. Lydia, citizen of the Pascua Yaqui Tribe (Yoeme) and Huichol (Wixáritari), earned her Bachelors of Science from California State University, Monterey Bay in Environmental Science, Technology and Policy. She completed her Ph.D. at the University of Arizona in the Department of Environmental Sciences, with a minor in American Indian Policy.

Her research interests are in soil health, environmental data stewardship and science communication. Lydia is a 2014 University of Arizona NIEHS Superfund Program trainee,  a 2015 recipient of National Science Foundation’s Graduate Research Fellowship Program, a 2019 American Geophysical Union  “Voices for Science” Fellow, a 2020 Native Nations Institute Indigenous Data Sovereignty Fellow, and a 2021 Data Science Fellow. Lydia was a Presidential Postdoctoral Fellow at Arizona State University (School of Sustainability) and Research Fellow at Duke University (Nicholas School of the Environment) prior to her current role as an Assistant Professor in Environmental Studies at Dartmouth College.

Outside of her scholarship, Lydia is passionate about connecting her scholarship to outdoor spaces, through running and increasing representation in outdoor recreation. Lydia has been recognized as a “trail runner changing the world” by REI Co-op and as an “Environmental Sports Champion” by the Lewis Pugh Foundation.

CO-FOUNDER

Christina E. Oré, MPH, DrPH, an Andean descendant of Huancavelica -Ayacucho Perú and Irish. Born and raised in O’odham and Yoeme lands, she has worked in public health for over twenty years. Dr Oré is a researcher of systems alignment for Indigenous health praxis/practice: Indigenous data governance, tribal data systems strengthening, traditional healing systems, multi-media/creative methodologies, relational and implementation sciences. Dr Oré is a member of the Collaboratory for Indigenous Data Governance, University of Arizona; co-leads with Dr Boulton the Whakauae Māori Research -Health Services and Seven Directions collaboration initiative; and is a member of the Indigenous working group, World Federation of Public Health Associations. She has a BA in Latin American Studies from Oberlin College, 1991. Dr Oré received her MPH in community health practice, 2001, and DrPH in public health policy and management, 2018, from the Zuckerman College of Public Health at the University of Arizona.