December Graduate Student of the Month

Scholarship: Special Higher Education Program
School: Columbia Law School
Degree: Juris Doctor

Community Service

• President, National Native American Law Students Association 2023-2025
• Board Director, National Native American Bar Association 2023-2025
• President, Columbia Native American Law Students Association 2023-2024
• Team Lead, Columbia Law School Wills Drafting Caravan to Wisconsin Tribes 2023-2025
• Articles Editor, Columbia Journal of Environmental Law 2024-2025
• Ambassador, Point Foundation 2024-2025
• Area 6 Representative, National Native American Law Students Association 2022-2023
• Co-Founder & Board Director, South Pacific Islander Organization 2018-2023
• Co-Chair, Stanford American Indian Organization 2011-2012
• Committee Member, Stanford Powwow 2011-2012

Eldred D. Lesansee (he/him), is passionate about the universal protection of Native American communities and their cultural heritage. Born and raised in and around the Pueblos of Jemez and Zuni in New Mexico, Eldred has worked to develop and implement policies to safeguard Native American cultural heritage. After learning of the French auction sales of sacred Hopi and Pueblo cultural items while studying abroad in Pairs, Eldred earned a Fulbright scholarship to France to study and research how to halt these sales. Since then, Eldred has gained professional experiences at the New Mexico Indian Affairs Department, the United Nations, UNESCO’s World Heritage Centre, the U.S. Embassy in France, and the U.S. Senate Committee on Indian Affairs.

In April 2023, Eldred was elected as President of the National Native American Law Students Association (National NALSA). With the support of the Executive Board, Eldred has aimed to educate others about Federal Indian Law’s significance to American jurisprudence as well as bolster the Indigenous law student population across the country. Led by his values of community, service, and inclusion, Eldred has worked to build community and center 2SLGBTQ+ and Black/Afro-Indigenous community members within the Association. On April 5, 2024, Eldred was re-elected to serve as the 55th President of the Association. Previously, he served as Area 6 Representative in his first year of law school.

Eldred is currently pursuing a Juris Doctor at Columbia Law School with a certificate in Global Business Law and Governance at Université Paris in Panthéon-Sorbonne and Sciences Po. His dream is to bring all that he has learned back to his Pueblo nations and become a legal advocate for Indigenous peoples universally. Eldred holds a B.A. in International Relations from Stanford University and a Master of International Development from the Sciences Po Paris School of International Affairs.

Native Forward Scholars Fund has empowered me to follow my dream of serving my Pueblo nations and all of Indian Country. Growing up, I was taught each Tribal member has a role to play to ensure the betterment of the greater whole. It is then one’s responsibility to choose that role based on their talents, skills, and experiences. For me, I have dedicated my life to the international protection an repatriation of Native American cultural heritage, which includes our intellectual cultural heritage such as traditional knowledge, languages, ceremonies, and beliefs.

As the first in my family to attend law school, I entered my legal studies with apprehension, timidness, and financial stress. I also felt isolated from my family, Tribal communities, and culture while studying in New York City. Yet, with Native Forward’s support from my very first semester at law school, I have been able to maximize my academic and professional experience at Columbia Law School. I have also been able to have a community away from home, as Native Forward hosted annual community gatherings in New York for its scholars, alumni, and community members. It was actually at these gatherings that I met some of my closest friends in NYC who were all from Tribes across the country.

I do not know what I would have done without Native Forward, and I am energized to give back to this community in any way possible as an alum.

Elahkwa/ Tebahnonpah! Thank you!

Want to be our next Student of the Month? Apply here!