About

Be Your Culture

Children, adults, teenagers, all of us are in need of fun, accurate, positive relationships. We share our lands, waters, and our space with one another, so we learn together in many ways already.

Nihewan’s main initiative, the Cradleboard Teaching Project, builds on these relationships and puts the realities about Indigenous people into the stories we share and the lessons we learn. Students are supported in raising test scores in core curriculum subjects at the same time as building a knowledge base about Indigenous people and cultures with their classroom partners far away.

We put your communities, teachers and students into the driver’s seat of delivering your own accurate enriching teaching materials in core subject matters, while partnering Indigenous and non-Indigenous, urban and on reserve students through effective teaching methods, new accurate and enriching curriculum materials, and engaging relationships. Build with us. Help support the work we do by donating to the Nihewan Foundation.

support

How to Donate

Thank you for your interest in donating to the Nihewan Foundation. 

Canadian Donors

You can donate by cheque made payable to Nihewan Foundation Inc. sent by mail to 160 John St., Suite 300,  Toronto, Ontario, M5V2E5, Canada.

Or you can contribute via Paypal by clicking on the button below:

American Donors

You can donate by cheque made payable to Nihewan Foundation sent by mail to 1801 Century Park East, Suite 1080 Los Angeles, CA 90067.

Or you can contribute via Paypal by clicking on the button below:

cradleboard-teaching-project
learn-teach-be-your-culture
support us

How to Donate

Thank you for your interest in donating to the Nihewan Foundation. 

Canadian Donors

You can donate by cheque made payable to Nihewan Foundation Inc. sent by mail to 160 John St., Suite 300,  Toronto, Ontario, M5V2E5, Canada.

Or you can contribute via Paypal by clicking on the button below:

American Donors

You can donate by cheque made payable to Nihewan Foundation sent by mail to 1801 Century Park East, Suite 1080 Los Angeles, CA 90067

Or you can contribute via Paypal by clicking on the button below:

cradleboard-teaching-project

Buffy Sainte-Marie

A cultural icon, award-winning musician and artist, Buffy Sainte-Marie has been a tireless crusader for Indigenous truths and stories.

As an educator and a knowledge-keeper, she uses her multimedia skills to create accurate, enriching core-subject teaching materials based in Indigenous cultural perspectives, and brings people together to share them in a meaningful way.

In the 1990s, with the help of support from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, the Ford Foundation, the Herb Alpert Foundation and the Global Fund for Children, Buffy Sainte-Marie put a team together under her charitable non-profit corporation, the Nihewan Foundation. They created the Cradleboard Teaching Project in the United States and Canada. The Cradleboard Teaching Project served children and teachers worldwide for 15 years – free, live, and online – connecting Indigenous and non-Indigenous classes through the new core curriculum.

The ideas developed through the Cradleboard Teaching Project have since been shared with teacher education departments, colleges and universities across Canada, fulfilling Buffy’s gut instinct to embed and improve education from within; without succumbing to the temptation to build a business, create an endowment, or otherwise divert from Nihewan’s mission to help children of all backgrounds through improved education. She continually extends the Nihewan mission into her artistic, educational, and personal life, has never taken a salary, and always kept the foundation operating costs under 15%.

Buffy Sainte-Marie has used the Cradleboard Teaching Project methods in working with teacher education departments in several universities, teaching them how to create their own localized indigenous interactive multimedia curriculum in science and other core subjects.

The Nihewan Foundation’s work in Canada is in the process of being revitalized. Stay tuned.

You can learn more via Buffy Sainte-Marie’s personal website through the Speak-Give-Teach: Philanthropy section.

Buffy Sainte-Marie

A cultural icon, award-winning musician and artist, Buffy Sainte-Marie has been a tireless crusader for Indigenous truths and stories.

As an educator and a knowledge-keeper, she uses her multimedia skills to create accurate, enriching core-subject teaching materials based in Indigenous cultural perspectives, and brings people together to share them in a meaningful way.

In the 1990s, with the help of support from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, the Ford Foundation, the Herb Alpert Foundation and the Global Fund for Children, Buffy Sainte-Marie put a team together under her charitable non-profit corporation, the Nihewan Foundation. They created the Cradleboard Teaching Project in the United States and Canada. The Cradleboard Teaching Project served children and teachers worldwide for 15 years – free, live, and online – connecting Indigenous and non-Indigenous classes through the new core curriculum.

The ideas developed through the Cradleboard Teaching Project have since been shared with teacher education departments, colleges and universities across Canada, fulfilling Buffy’s gut instinct to embed and improve education from within; without succumbing to the temptation to build a business, create an endowment, or otherwise divert from Nihewan’s mission to help children of all backgrounds through improved education. She continually extends the Nihewan mission into her artistic, educational, and personal life, has never taken a salary, and always kept the foundation operating costs under 15%.

Buffy Sainte-Marie has used the Cradleboard Teaching Project methods in working with teacher education departments in several universities, teaching them how to create their own localized indigenous interactive multimedia curriculum in science and other core subjects.

The Nihewan Foundation’s work in Canada is in the process of being revitalized. Stay tuned.

You can learn more via Buffy Sainte-Marie’s personal website through the Speak-Give-Teach: Philanthropy section.

Support Us

For Indigenous Education

Click one of the buttons below to donate

Canadian Donors

American Donors