The Plateau Center Project–an Idea Whose Time Has Come
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We are on the verge of a major breakthrough and we’re calling on the liberal arts community for help and support.

The College of Liberal Arts at Washington State University has been working tirelessly to develop the Plateau Center Project, a plan which will benefit the area’s eight native tribes, the faculty and students of Washington State University, and local and state economies.

The Plateau Tribes have signed a memorandum of agreement with Washington State University which is supported by the Affiliated Tribes of Northwest Indians (ATNI). Operating under this agreement, the university in collaboration with the tribes will pursue research projects for faculty and students, and programs to benefit the native peoples in this region. This is valuable to the tribes and to Washington State, especially the College of Liberal Arts, because our departments already include many programs specific to native cultures. For example, our anthropology department has special programs for the preservation of cultural artifacts. Speech and hearing sciences has special programs and expertise in dealing with issues specific to Native Americans. Our English department studies the literatures of multiple cultures. Faculty members and graduate students in the School of Music and Theatre Arts research music produced by plateau tribes. The comparative American cultures program is uniquely qualified to create programs addressing the issues of native peoples in the Columbia Basin. Our public history program investigates the role played by local tribes in developing important treaties and their implications for the tribes, as well as the relationships between state and local governments and these tribal communities. And that mentions just programs which exist and does not begin to explore the programs which might be developed.

Our vision includes creation of a central place at Washington State University to assist tribes in working through issues of cultural preservation and working through governance issues. The tribes will be better connected to take advantage of all the university and its faculty have to offer. Our students, in turn, will have a better knowledge of their history as Americans and a better ability to work with people across cultures.

The university has done its part. At the request of Dean Barbara Couture, Washington State University President V. Lane Rawlins has allocated seed money to develop the idea. In addition, we are working on funding at the federal level with a consortium of land grant universities calling the effort, Northwest Regional Native American Project (or NRNAP… we pronounce it, Nurr-Nap).

We are asking you to support this effort by contacting your legislators in Washington D.C., informing them of this project and asking them to support it. It is only with Federal funding that we will be able to see The Plateau Center Project flourish.