D-Q University

D-Q University Sign off of County Road 31 heading West.

Few people are aware that there are two universities in and near Davis. The "other" one is D-Q University, a tribal community college that has a focus on indigenous peoples. It is the only tribal university in California and faced severe financial and accreditation issues. Founded in 1971, it is the only indigenous-controlled institution of higher learning located outside a reservation.

D-Q stands for Deganawidah-Quetzalcoatl. Deganawidah is known as the "Great Peacemaker" who inspired the founding of the Iroquois Confederacy. Quetzalcoatl ("feathered snake") is the major Aztec God.

Accreditation and Financial Issues

The school was in the news after it lost its accreditation in January of 2005. The school then closed down amid various political problems, misallocation of funds, and a battle between two boards of directors for control. The issue was settled when a judge reappointed the original board as the legal trustees of the school. They lost substantial funding when their Indian enrollment dropped below 51%. Most of the students are Hispanic. Now D-Q University is back on the road to full fledged service (see Davis Enterprise article below).

In the news

• Protesters demonstrate at D-Q University
  

• "'D -QU can keep its land - Tribal college proves to feds it's offering classes"'
  

Davis Enterprise, The (CA) - Thursday, December 4, 2008
Author: Sharon Stello ; Enterprise staff writer

D - Q University has met conditions required to keep land that the shuttered tribal college was in jeopardy of losing.

The state's only Native American college, 7 miles west of Davis, has been closed since losing its accreditation in 2005. Last spring, the college learned it could lose part of the land if it didn't start holding classes — conditions of the deed overseen by the U.S. General Services Administration.

After the D -QU board of trustees submitted proof of nonprofit status and an academic plan showing educational use of the land, college CEO Margaret Hoaglen submitted a final letter to the federal government Nov. 20, certifying that the property is at all times being used solely by the college for its educational programs.

Gene Gibson, spokeswoman for the GSA Pacific Rim Region, said in an e-mail Tuesday that "GSA has identified D -QU as in compliance per the requirements of the land deed (land conveyance)."

D -QU board member Susan Reece said "we're happy about the outcome."

"A big load has been lifted off our shoulders," Reece added.

After overcoming this roadblock, now the board can begin moving forward, but Reece notes that "it's going to take years before we're fully recovered."

D -QU is not yet offering traditional college courses for undergraduates, but rather seminars and workshops on occupational skills and environmental planning for tribal employees in the state.

The campus recently completed a three-month wildlife habitat seminar and project connected to a grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Reece said. That grant will help the struggling college pay some of its mounting bills.

Reece said another seminar likely will begin in January. And the board of trustees is working to set up a new agreement with farmer and Yolo County Supervisor Duane Chamberlain to teach agriculture at the college so he can continue farming on the land he leases from the college.

GSA had been concerned by the college's long-running lease with Chamberlain, allowing him to grow alfalfa and grass hay on part of the land. GSA said the property had to be used for educational purposes.

The indigenous college was established at the former Army communications site after a group of Native Americans and Chicanos jumped the fence and occupied the land in 1970.

The college sits on two parcels. The eastern portion, where the college buildings are, falls under a charitable trust grant from the state. The western portion falls under a returned quit claim deed overseen by GSA.

Gibson said GSA has no interest in taking that land back, but that's what would have happened if the college had failed to meet the deed's stipulations.

History

DQU's first open house in Sept 1971 was big news in Davis. Stories from the Sept 23, 2007 Davis Enterprise.
Barbeques, drum dancing, stories of Deganawidah and Quetzalcoatl, and a rep from Governor Reagan's office were all part of the first Indian Day Indian Day will be celebrated from 1 p.m. until as far into the night as people want to go

Timeline

• 1971 Students hop fence and claim unused military property. After lengthy negotiations, US government awards D-Q University title to the land.
  

• 1978-11-04 School becomes Indian-controlled.
  

• 2005-01-12 The Accrediting Commission for Community and Junior Colleges drops D-Q's accreditation.
  

• 2005-01-28 Officials announce university shut-down.
  

• 2005-03-09 Students defy order to leave, and remain in the dorms.
  

• 2005-04-13 Yolo County Superior Court Judge David Rosenberg has issued a temporary restraining order that appoints the original board of trustees as being in charge of University affairs. This resolves a power struggle between the original and a new board that had attempted to gain control over University affairs.
  

• 2005-05-17 A Yolo Superior Court Judge rules that previous board is only valid one.
  

• 2005-09-19 DQU officially reopens. They are working hard to regain their reputation.
  

• 2005-11-03 Supporters walk seven miles down County Road 31 to commemorate 35 years of struggle.
  

• 2005-11-12 Veterans Day powwow.
  

• 2006-01-28 Healing dance, spring classes begin.
  

• 2006-03-14 Protesters demonstrate unjust expulsions and evictions from D-Q.

• Sometime prior to 2008-07-23, the University closed (confirmed by the Davis Chamber of Commerce and the City of Davis).

Comments:

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I totally thought this was a Dairy Queen University of some kind, i was like what the...? —DomenicSantangelo

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Their website says, The "D" stands for the name of the Great Peacemaker who inspired the founding of the Iroquois Confederacy; the full name symbolized by the "D" is used only in a religious context. The "Q" represents Quetzalcoatl, an Aztec prophet, who symbolizes the principles of wisdom and self-discipline". Does this mean that it is improper or blasphemous to give the information on the D-Q name as to the "D" part? —jr

• Yes, I've read this numerous times. I think it would be respectful to delete the spelled-out word, although we could leave the link. — DougWalter
  

  It's not a religious thing as much as it is an honor thing. They prefer to call him the great peace maker instead of his name out of respect for him and his work. It's not blasphemy like vocalizing the tetragrammation. -wl
  

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2009-02-19 16:11:07   Whoever writes and/or maintains the information presented on this page needs to include (aat the very least) a thumbnail sketch of the school's very turbulent history from 2005 to 2009. ALSO: the article from the Davis Enterprise newspaper (as reproduced above) tells only part of the real story. Very little is to be learned from the person quoted in Sharon Stello's article. Susan Reece is not even a member of the D-Q University Board of Trustees. In the article, she merely mouths The Official Party Line from the point-of-view of the VERY corrupt little circle of American Indian people who claim to be the school's legal representatives. The General Services Administration is correspondingly clueless: it is plain to see that the GSA's public relations department has swallowed Reece's burlesque act, hook, line, and sinker. The American Indian activist community has consistently given the Davis Enterprise miserably-low ratings for its' very one-sided "coverage" of the Land and Leadership Controversy at D-Q University. *from: Mr. Steve Jerome-Wyatt, former twice-elected, President of the D-Q University Associated Student Body Governmnet, (1997-98) and Acknowledged Spokesman for the Affiliated Obsidian Nation in Davis, CA. —deepbluedream

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2009-09-26 16:46:04   Recently, a letter addressed to the DQ University Board of Trustees has been circulated throughout the community. The letter was written by Pat Wright in support of her husband, Bill Wright (Wintun/Patwin), and his perceived role as an “Indian doctor” at DQ University.

Mrs. Wright states that she and her husband have invested a great deal of “time and energy” at DQ over the past 25 years, and she goes on to infer that since the school is situated on land within the historic territory of the Wintun/ Patwin tribes, that Mr. Wright should have religious oversight at the institution; an authority that Mrs. Wright refers to in the letter as the “hierarchy of territory.”

While I respect Mr. Wright and support his dedication to the spiritual needs of members of the California Indian community, I must take issue with Mrs. Wright’s assessment of any so-called religious “hierarchy” at DQ University.

Mrs. Wright does not seem to understand DQ’s complicated history, or the initial guidelines and objectives set in place during the institution’s founding. DQ was not established solely as an institution for California Indians, but for Indians of all nations. This is an important fact that can easily be found in the school’s charter. I know this to be true because I have been working at DQ University since 1974 – some ten years before Mr. Wright ever appeared on the scene.

DQ University was founded in 1971 to provide a more appropriate, culturally-sensitive method of education for Native American students. It was one of the first six American Indian colleges in the United States. Among its educational objectives, the preservation of traditional Native religious values and practices was a major priority.

The story of Native Americans in California began with the indigenous people who lived here in harmony for thousands of years before Europeans and Americans disrupted the balanced system within which these people lived. But the story did not end there. In the twentieth century, it came to include members of other tribes sent into the region as well. Being compelled to share territory is not a phenomenon exclusive to California Indians – it is just one part of the removal / relocation of Native people from ancestral homelands that has taken place on a nationwide basis.

DQ University was founded during the Era of Termination and Relocation in the wake of the BIA’s Urban Indian Relocation Program. Under the auspices of this program, over 100,000 American Indians were relocated from their homes on rural reservations and in tribal communities across the United States to urban areas. A few cities within the state of California, specifically Los Angeles, San Francisco, and San Jose were designated as new home sites for thousands of these displaced, intertribal Native people.

It was these Indians, from tribally-diverse backgrounds, who sought out a special place where they would be able to establish a more valuable form of culturally-based education; one that included Native history, language, culture, and spirituality in order to help prepare Indian students for the multi-cultural world, while at the same time, supporting their distinctive tribal identities. As such, DQ became part of the first American Indian Higher Education Consortium in 1972.

These new urban Indians utilized the same strategy to obtain the site upon which DQ stands as they did in their quest to bring attention to the treaty violations of the federal government during the occupation of Alcatraz Island. They used the 1868 Treaty of Fort Laramie between the U.S. and the Sioux Nation, which mandates that any federal property initially taken from Indian people must be returned to them if the government ceases to use it or abandons the property. DQ is the decommissioned site of the U.S. Army West Coast Relay and Radio Transmitting Station. Native American access to the site was initially denied, but our people conducted a series of protests and access was finally granted in 1970. The school opened in 1971 obtaining accreditation in 1977.

Mr. and Mrs. Wright state that, in their opinion, sweats should be “conducted by a competent leader, because what happens in the sweat lodge reflects back on all aspects of DQU.” I was raised traditionally and have conducted Inipi ceremonies since I was a very young man. It is a responsibility that I take very seriously. I guard the proceedings at the sweat lodge very carefully, protecting the rite from any inappropriate influences.

For that reason, under the administration of Dave Risling, I was asked to fill the position of cultural advisor at DQ, and in fulfillment of that request, I presided over sweat lodge activities at the school for over three decades. I was also employed as a traditional councilor by Oakland IHS, and ran sweats there for many years.

While it is true that Inipi has been adopted as a method of prayer for a number of intertribal purposes, I am deeply offended by Mr. and Mrs. Wright’s description of it as a “generic ceremony.” There is nothing generic in the spiritual and physical healing that occurs as a result of participation in an Inipi. For many American Indians in California, especially those who have been transplanted to the state from their native homelands, the Inipi also represents cultural persistence and empowerment – a chance to practice their religious traditions away from home. Many of these people need the continued stability and spiritual outlet the sweat lodge provides. Now, that option-the most successful operation DQ has ever known - has been taken from the people. Taking this from them is tantamount to denying them religious freedom.

Finally, I want to point to Mr. and Mrs. Wright’s statement, that as a part of the larger community of California Indians, they “hold the dream of one day seeing a university that celebrates the tribes of California,” and that “DQ could become a model for the preservation of California tribal languages and cultures.”

While I agree that this is a beautiful and worthwhile dream, I must reiterate the fact that DQ University was not created for the purpose of serving California Indians alone, and it was not only California Indians who worked to establish the institution in the first place, or who struggled to support and maintain the school over the past thirty years. DQ has always been a place for Indians of all tribes, and must continue to be so. Any attempt to initiate any sort of tribal hierarchy, or to specify one tribal tradition over another defeats the institution’s entire founding purposes. In my opinion, doing so will bring about the final downfall of DQ University.

Respectfully,

Darrell Standing Elk


Sicangu Lakota

Note: On August 5, 2009 the DQ Board of Trustees ordered the sweat lodge at DQU closed and sent police to interrupt the Inipi ceremony that was already in progress. Those gathered for prayer were ordered off the premises and forced to leave the Inipi fire burning.

—StandingElk