Much thanks to everyone for helping the MNL hit our fundraising goal three days early! Additional gifts between now and our campaign end date on Monday (May 10) will help us provide additional resources and support to Native American UO students.

The Many Nations Longhouse (MNL) serves as a "home away from home" for the University of Oregon's Native American (American Indian/Alaska Native) students, faculty, and staff. Constructed in 2005 in partnership with Oregon's nine federally recognized tribes, the longhouse hosts special events for local Native American communities as well as cultural programming and activities for UO students. Its mission is to provide welcome, respecting the diversity of numerous American Indian cultures and beliefs. 

Your gift in support of the Many Nations Longhouse supports the many programs and services that contribute to the extraordinary academic success of UO's Native American students, ensuring we have adequate resources to meet increased student and community demand when the UO campus reopens.

MNL initiatives help increase the recruitment, retention, and graduation of Native American (American Indian/Alaska Native) students while nurturing a sense of belonging and community. Resources include:

• The MNL Student Pantry, which provides food and beverages so that students can get a quick bite on the run or during study hours
• The Indigenous Women's Wellness Group, which was originally created to respond to the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women crisis and now includes more than 20 women
• The MNL Green Roof, originally composed of more than 20 indigenous Oregon grasses and other native perennials, which is in need of replanting
• The Annual UO Mother's Day Powwow and Salmon Bake, which is the oldest college powwow in the nation and celebrates mothers' importance in the traditions and persistence of Native American communities

The MNL continues to support Native students in their educational journeys during the COVID-19 pandemic. We have transitioned to virtual versions of community events for academic year 2020-21, with limited building access for students to pick up supplies and receive socially distanced, in-person support.

"Each of us has an ancestor who sacrificed and survived so we could have the choices we do today," says  Assistant Vice President and Advisor to the President on Sovereignty and Government-to-Government Relations Jason Younker (Coquille), MS '98, PhD '03. "Please choose to support our American Indian/Alaska Native students who depend upon the programs and services provided at the UO."

History of the Many Nations Longhouse

Designed by UO alumnus and National Museum of the American Indian lead architect Johnpaul Jones (Choctaw/Cherokee), BArch '77, the Many Nations Longhouse was inspired by traditional Kalapuya longhouse design. Each of Oregon's nine federally recognized Tribes of Oregon each contributed funds and/or materials to the construction of the new Many Nations Longhouse in 2005—the first time all nine contributed to a community structure in modern history. After a grand opening that drew tribal elders, community members, students, and alumni from all over Oregon, the MNL was blessed and dedicated as sacred ground. 

Today, the longhouse hosts Native American Student Union (NASU) and Native American Law Student Association (NALSA) meetings. The MNL continues to be a place of congregation as well as a symbolic embassy for tribal governments, hosting periodical tribal government council meetings and meetings between tribal chairs as part of the UO President’s Native American Advisory Council two times each year.

Honoring Native Peoples and Lands

The University of Oregon is located on Kalapuya Ilihi, the traditional indigenous homeland of the Kalapuya people. Following treaties between 1851 and 1855, Kalapuya people were dispossessed of their indigenous homeland by the United States government and forcibly removed to the Coast Reservation in Western Oregon. Today, Kalapuya descendants are primarily citizens of the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde and the Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians, and they continue to make important contributions to their communities, to the UO, to Oregon, and to the world.

In following the Indigenous protocol of acknowledging the original people of the land we occupy, we also extend our respect to the nine federally recognized Indigenous Nations of Oregon: the Burns Paiute Tribe, the Confederated Tribes of the Coos, Lower Umpqua and Siuslaw Indians, the Confederated Tribes of the Grand Ronde, the Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians, the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation, the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs, the Coquille Indian Tribe, the Cow Creek Band of Umpqua Tribe of Indians, and the Klamath Tribes. We express our respect to the many more tribes who have ancestral connections to this territory, as well as to all other displaced Indigenous peoples who call Oregon home.