Native Americans emphasize community relationships over the individual. Those relationships led Dr. Michelle Sarche into early childhood development. The opportunity to work with Buffett Early Childhood Institute in Omaha enticed Sarche to leave the University of Colorado system.

"It's about the relationships and the connections that we have to our communities, our families, our colleagues in professional spaces," Sarche said. "I just feel that I couldn't be here doing what I do, if it weren't for all of the relationships that I've had over all these years, and the genuine connections. And the trust that that builds over all these years."

Sarche is considered one of the nation's premier experts regarding Native American early childhood development. She has worked with Native American communities for more than 25 years, researching ways to improve access and quality in tribal early childhood programs.

In her role at Buffett, Sarche works with Native American and Alaska Native communities as she focuses on children’s development, parenting and early care environments, such as Head Start, home visiting, and childcare. The Omaha area has about 80 tribal nations represented.

Sarche, a licensed clinical psychologist, also serves as a professor with tenure at the Munroe-Meyer Institute at the University of Nebraska Medical Center.

Having Sarche join Buffett Early Childhood Institute helps the center expand its outreach to Native American communities, said Dr. Walter Gilliam, the institute's executive director.

"(Michelle) has contributed immensely to the field of early childhood development and education and has done so with great care and respect for the Native American communities she works alongside,” Gilliam said. “Her research and scholarship will only help the Buffett Institute grow its research and grant opportunities, while also elevating the needs and voices of the Tribal communities in Nebraska and beyond.”

An enrolled citizen of the Lac Courte Oreilles Band of Ojibwe, Sarche said she credits her grandmother with developing her interest in the importance of early childhood development.

Her grandmother died shortly after Sarche graduated from college in 1991, igniting a passion to know even more about her.

"I think in her passing and in my desire to get to know her even more than I did when she was alive, to try to really understand her life and being a Native person was very much a part of who she was," she said. "She grew up in the era of boarding schools, and she grew up in a time and a place when being Native was difficult. You could argue it's still difficult, but she grew up in a time and a place when it was a real struggle to survive, not necessarily from a physical sense, but also cultural and spiritual, and your sense of self."

Leaving the comfort and security of her Wisconsin reservation, Sarche's grandmother lived in a predominantly non-Native town. She faced challenges, such as racism, head-on, Sarche said.

"She was the only Person of Color there, really," she said. "So I think she just had to do her best to find her footing in that space, if you will."

Growing up in an urban environment, herself, Sarche said she sought to learn more about reservation life. She found herself visiting Hayward, Wisconsin.

"It was just a deep longing to know her that took me to the place of her birth," Sarche said. "And I just have committed my life to working in and with tribal communities. I feel very, very blessed and fortunate that my ancestors fought for their tribe and their community. As a citizen of the Lac Courte Band of the Ojibwe tribe, that citizenship means everything to me."

Graduate school at Loyola University in Chicago emphasized Sarche's need to focus on Native American early childhood education, she said. Very little data was available on the subject. She has spent her career developing relationships and information to help Native American children.

Early childhood development can differ between reservation and urban communities, Sarche said. Families on reservations may be more involved with tradition and culture, such as naming ceremonies, than urban Native families, she said.

"The Lakota believe children are sacred ones," she said. "They believe as a baby travels through life, they pass their ancestors, learning from them along the way."

Urban families may have less access to their specific tribal community, beliefs, practices and language, Sarche said.

"This is not to say that everybody living in a reservation community has access, because of these forces, these historical forces, historical trauma," Sarche said.

Childhood development programs, such as Head Start, can focus on establishing a strong foundation for Native American children, Sarche said.

"Early childhood, just in terms of human development, is a very foundational period of time when we're really laying the foundation upon which further state later stages of development are built," she did. "I would say that for tribal communities, and I can't say whether or not this is true for other communities, but the really, really powerful piece are those traditional cultural, spiritual beliefs about who children are, where they come from, and their role within families, communities and cultures."

Since joining the Buffett Institute last December, Sarche has been working on projects allowing the organization to collaborate with Indigenous health research centers nationwide, including the Centers for American Indian and Alaska Native Health at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus and the Center for Indigenous Health at the Johns Hopkins University.

Sarche also maintains her involvement with the Tribal Early Childhood Research Center (TRC), the Native Children’s Research Exchange (NCRE) Conference and Scholars program, the Center for Indigenous Research Collaborations and Learning in Home Visiting (CIRCLE-HV), and the Community-Driven Indigenous Research, Cultural Strengths and Leadership to Advance Equity in Substance Use Outcomes (CIRCLE) P50 Center of Excellence. The CIRCLE Center has been funded by the National Institutes of Health and serves as a hub for Indigenous-led research to address substance-use issues and inequities, prevention and recovery.

Throughout her career, Sarche has helped raise millions of dollars in grant and contract funding from sources such as the federal Administration for Children and Families, the National Institute on Drug Abuse and the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. Since 2018, Sarche has been an Aspen Institute Ascend Fellow.

Tim Trudell is a freelance writer and online content creator. His work has appeared in Flatwater Free Press, Next Avenue, Indian Country Today, Nebraska Life, Nebraska Magazine, Council Bluffs Daily Non-Pareil and Douglas County Post Gazette, among others. He is a citizen of the Santee Dakota Nation.