Native American Heritage Month 2021

Our president, Sheldon Williams, helped organize the United State's Coast Guard's (USCG) celebration of Native American Heritage Month on Base Alameda in Alameda, CA.

EDFU Foundation's president, Sheldon Williams, with the guest of honor, Rochelle Diver.

2021 Theme

Grounded in Tradition, Resilient in Spirit

Mr.Williams is a Chief Warrant officer in the USCG and is active in promoting diversity and inclusion within the force. This year, he made sure the celebration was a success and honored America's indigenous community. He reached out our Rochelle Diver to be the 2021 guest speaker. Ms.Diver spoke about the history of the Native peoples in the Bay Area, the occupation of Alcatraz, and the Indian Treaty Council and how they went to the United Nations to urge them to create what we know today as the United Forum for Indigenous Peoples.

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​Rochelle Diver, Anishinaabe, is a member of Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Ojibwe. She is currently a consultant for the International Indian Treaty Council’s (IITC), an organization of Indigenous Peoples from North, Central, South America, the Caribbean and the Pacific working for the sovereignty and self-determination of Indigenous Peoples and the recognition and protection of Indigenous rights, treaties, traditional cultures and sacred lands. Rochelle’s work focuses on the interconnectedness between environmental toxics, women’s reproductive health and health for Indigenous women, girls, and future generations.  Rochelle feels a strong obligation to fight for clean air, water, and food sovereignty near her homelands in the Great Lakes region as well as around the globe. She has proudly represented her Nation and the IITC in various United Nation’s Treaty Bodies and mechanisms including the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, the Minamata Convention on Mercury, the Stockholm and Rotterdam Conventions and the Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. She has also organized grassroots human rights and capacity building trainings on environmental health locally, nationally and internationally. She obtained a Bachelor of Arts from University of Minnesota in Sociology and American Indian Studies and Master of Human Rights from the University of Sydney.