Johnny Talawyma was ready to stride across the stage to receive his bachelors degree diploma last spring.
It's been a long journey for the 38-year-old Montana State University Billings student who grew up on the Northern Cheyenne Reservation. He wanted a chance not only to celebrate himself, but to set an example for younger people in his tribe.
COVID-19 changed that, like it has so many other things. Graduation seems almost distant now for Talawyma. His uncle died after contracting COVID-19. Other relatives battled severe symptoms. Talawyma himself contracted the disease and recovered.
Native American students already face barriers in the pursuit of higher education. As COVID-19 has disproportionately sickened and killed Native Americans, Talawyma and other students have worked to maintain the communities they have, both on campus and on the reservation.
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As he's continued to work toward a master's degree, Talawyma is also trying to care for family members. When he visits the reservation, he loads up with supplies for them like cold medicine and tissues.
Shannon Birdinground is Talawyma's niece, a fellow student, and a Northern Cheyenne tribal member. Both are part of an urban American Indian population that often has strong ties to reservations while living in predominantly white cities. They've experienced the COVID-19 pandemic through both lenses.
Birdinground recalls reading about the risk to Native Americans early in the pandemic.
"People were saying, Native Americans were at higher risk, I saw so many comments on social media saying, how?"
'Virgin soil'
Joe McGeshick is MSUB's tribal liaison and a Native American Studies Instructor. He gave a daily lecture over the past week as part of campus events for Native American Week, "COVID-19 in Indian Country."
It went far beyond the sterility of the daily map updates from state health officials, which show alarmingly high case figures in counties like Big Horn, Rosebud and Roosevelt. The map doesn't plot reservations.
It's a "virgin soil epidemic," he said, something that has ravaged American Indian tribes since European explorers landed in what they thought was a New World.
Death toll estimates from European diseases range between 90% and 50% of the original human inhabitants of the Americas, who had no immunity to smallpox, influenza strains and other diseases.
The western institutions that followed European settlement to control disease — hospitals, vaccinations, public health measures — have never served Native Americans as well as whites, McGeshick said.
It's not so much that the pandemic created inequities; it exposed them.
He highlighted entrenched disparities in housing, health care, and transportation that have all contributed to the pandemic's severity on reservations.
Even access to water is variable, though more reliable than desert communities like the Navajo Reservation. McGeshick showed photos from a water hauling station on the Fort Peck Reservation, where he grew up.
"One of the best mitigation efforts is, wash your hands. We take that for granted," he said.
Indian Health Service facilities are often distrusted and inadequate, he said, and require long trips from some parts of reservations.
"Even if you do have symptoms, even if you do come down with COVID, where are you going to go, what are you going to do?" he said.
Advice about isolation and social distancing flies in the face of communal traditions.
"We live constantly by each other, close to each other, with each other," said McGeshick.
McGeshick grew up on the Fort Peck Reservation, with his eight siblings in a one bedroom house. When he talks about structural challenges on reservations that make it difficult to control COVID-19, he's lived it.
"You can't self-isolate if you don't have the room," he said.
On campus
The new sweat lodge at MSUB's Native American Achievement center was used 15 times before COVID-19 restrictions shut it down. The center itself had to close for two weeks already this year.
The U.S. has wide achievement gaps between white and Native American students. Montana's universities are no different. Native American students are less likely to enroll in universities or graduate.
One of the largest challenges is culture shock. Talawyma, a self-described "reservation boy coming to the city," was overwhelmed by Billings and the campus environment at first.
He'd had an early crack at college, attending a small school in Kansas. He developed substance use problems, which derailed his education. He's now clean and works as an addiction counselor, and spent two years at Chief Dull Knife College in Lame Deer before attending MSUB.
For too many students, college feels like "fighting your way through what we would call a white man's world," Birdinground said.
Finding a sense of community at MSUB was critical for both, and the Native American Achievement Center served as a hub; Talawyma became president of the school's All-Nations club.
The spring shutdowns and abrupt transition to online-only learning disrupted life for students across the U.S.
Some of what the Center usually does to aid students has been compromised during the pandemic. In-person powwows have been shut down this summer and fall, and other events have been canceled. But the All-Nations group still plans to hold a Halloween celebration with outdoor activities and safety measures. It gives students a chance to bring their wider families to campus.
McGeshick hopes to do more outreach with local Native American high school students. Visits from a local drum group have been canceled, but he believes the university has a chance to encourage Billings students to stay close to home for college.
Back and forth
Birdinground gets frustrated driving through Lame Deer. Tribes, including the Northern Cheyenne, have issued some of the most restrictive COVID-19 prevention rules in the nation. But she sees some people living their lives unchanged, especially those who are homeless or struggle with substance abuse.
That's not unique to reservations; people across Montana and the U.S. have flouted rules like mask mandates. But with the underlying factors that can fan the spread of disease, such behavior can have sharp consequences.
The mix of rules in different communities also sends mixed messages.
"What do you say, when you're Native? White guys, they get to go everywhere," McGeshick said.
Both Birdinground and Talawyma were unhappy with how the pandemic has been handled on the Northern Cheyenne reservation by local officials and federal leaders. They continue to worry about the health of family members, about the cultural traditions that elders carry.
Ultimately, dealing with the pandemic will require cooperation and joint solutions, McGeshick said.
"We have to look at each other as a connected people and act that way," he said — "even if we don't believe the science, even if we believe that the moon has been made out of cheese."