FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: January, 23, 2025
Rapid City, SD – Yesterday, NDN Collective announced Wizipan Little Elk Garriott will serve as the organization’s new president, alongside founder Nick Tilsen who will continue to serve as CEO, and Gaby Strong who will continue to serve as vice president.
Today, to offer a deep dive into the organization’s vision for the future as well as the trio of leaders’ political analysis of ongoing work like LANDBACK, cultural reclamation, and so much more, NDN Collective released a new episode on their podcast, LANDBACK For the People.
LANDBACK For the People is available on Spotify, Apple Music, and wherever you listen to podcasts – as well as with video on YouTube.
“As I think about NDN Collective, I think about how much shared leadership is in this organization,” said Nick Tilsen, founder and CEO of NDN Collective. “As senior leadership, our job is to steward, to caretake – because we have so many leaders here already. I think of Indigenous leadership as a circle, not a pyramid. At different times, some of us have to step into the middle of the circle and say ‘I will lead this part of the work.’ ”
“Indigenous leadership is intergenerational – on one hand, we need our elders saying ‘go do this’ and then you need other people to go do it,” said Wizipan Little Elk Garriott, NDN Collective President. “The other day, my five year old son asked me: if I saw a sign saying the Black Hills are for sale, would I go knock it down? That’s leadership – that’s the youth telling us where to go and what to concentrate on.”
“It’s a pretty special thing that when you look at the three of us here, we are part of the Oceti Sakowin, connected through LANDBACK and what happened at Standing Rock,” said Gaby Strong, NDN Collective Vice President. “When I think of leadership, it is the people who love their people enough to be able to be called upon and to step forward when asked. There’s a certain humility that is necessary for leadership to always come from a place of love and compassion – but also to be brave and do what needs to be done.”
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NDN Collective is an Indigenous-led organization dedicated to building Indigenous power. Through organizing, activism, philanthropy, grantmaking, capacity-building, and narrative change, we are creating sustainable solutions on Indigenous terms.