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Snow
followed his son, Darrien, now 6, and Darrien’s mother back
to Fort Belknap, 20 miles from his hometown of Chinook. He began
volunteering at the Fort Belknap college radio station, KGVA,
and was hired within a month. Now, about a year later, he’s
the station manager.
“I never
realized how much a person could miss home,” Snow says as he changes CDs. “I
enjoy working here. You have to be pretty thick-skinned. Plus, I like to hear
myself talk.”
He and another
DJ talk about crazy shows from the station’s past. The latest idea is to
shoot Snow with Mace, and broadcast the results, something Snow willingly agrees
too.
His laugh
echoes in the tiny on-air room. It’s easy to see why many see Snow as a
force, the man who once packed up and left for Denver on nothing but a whim and
400 bucks.
His normally
flawless voice is raspy today due to a nagging cold. Wanting to save himself,
and his listeners, Snow keeps the talking to a minimum, the music to a maximum.
He puts in
long hours running the station. “I have a hard time saying no,” Snow
says. “You are the radio station.”
Snow, in his
on-air persona, is a popular figure in the area.
When “Luke
Warm Water” is on air calls stream in from across the reservation and,
more recently, also from Malta high school students for song requests.
Snow also
has a full slate emceeing local events, from walk-a-thons to stock car races.
While Snow
has no aspirations to finish his degree, Neil Rock says he ponders enrolling
at MSU-Northern to complete his.
Rock, who
is Assiniboine, also had his share of troubles while at Bozeman: Living in North
Hedges dormitory at age 25 made him the butt of jokes.
“A lot
of kids called me gramps,” Rock says with a slight lisp. “Gramps!”
Finding friends
in a crowded freshman dorm proved to be difficult for him. And as the friends
he did have began graduating, the pool seemed to shrink.
“I didn’t
really have anyone to talk to,” he complains. “I mean, yeah, I could
talk to everyone in my dorm, but they’re children.
“That’s
basically what they were to me, children. I was trying to find someone to relate
to.”
A year out
of high school, Rock joined the Navy and served as a boatswain mate. In Bozeman,
he made a few friends also out of the service, but still missed the familiarity
of Fort Belknap.
“Basically,
I didn’t have the support I had there, not just by my parents, but also
by the community,” Rock says.
“I had
very few friends. I had no one to confide in.”
After a year
and a half, Rock opted to leave college. He is now 30 and unemployed. Rock spends
his days waiting for his father to return from work with the car they both share. He
says he wants to enroll at MSU-Northern, but needs money to do it.
Before 2003,
the Packard Foundation might have helped.
But when the
stock market and economy began to plunge in 2001, the foundation lost hundreds
of millions, according to Helen Doyle, a former director for the foundation’s
science endeavors. The Tribal Scholars Program—among others—ended
up cut.
“It
wasn’t about lack of success rates, ever,” Doyle says, referring
to the program’s end.
Hopkins says
the scholarship drove her to finish school. She and Doney-Cochran each received
an extra $10,000 after asking the foundation for further help.
“I was
blessed to get it (the scholarship),” Hopkins says. “I didn’t
want to abuse the fact I got it.
“I didn’t
want to take advantage of it. It really had a lot to do with me making sure I
got a degree out of the deal.”
Hopkins says
she counsels students that they need self-motivation and urges them to earn degrees
at four-year colleges.
“Fort
Belknap is a wonderful start, wonderful,” she says. “But go beyond
that.”
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