UNITY joined in the 40th Anniversary celebration of the American Indian Science and Engineering Society (AISES) at its annual conference held last week in Denver, Colorado. UNITY’s Executive Director Mary Kim Titla and Wellness Warriors Program Manager LorenAshley Buford addressed about 1,900 attendees during Opening Ceremonies promoting UNITY’s youth programs including the first-of-its-kind Wellness Warriors mobile app, which includes a Wellness Tracker that lets you monitor your spiritual, mental, physical, and social development through daily entries.

AISES and UNITY teamed up this past year through a signing of a Memorandum of Understanding. AISES and UNITY have complementary missions and they serve a largely common target population of youth. The purpose of the MOU is to help effectively further the organizations’ respective missions, establish a formal cooperative relationship that will effectively extend the opportunities for the two organizations to the combined network of youth members, and more effectively and efficiently make use of resources for the benefit of both organizations’ youth members.

Dozens of Native youth stopped by the UNITY booth to learn more about UNITY and take selfies with the UNITY Eagle mascot. Today’s Native Leaders Program Coordinator Lynnann Yazzie conducted a workshop promoting the UNITY TNL Action Planning curriculum, which focuses on the youth-led development and implementation of community service projects.

The American Indian Science and Engineering Society (AISES) is a national, nonprofit organization focused on substantially increasing the representation of American Indians, Alaska Natives, Native Hawaiians, Pacific Islanders, First Nations and other indigenous peoples of North America in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) studies and careers.