Rochelle Ettawageshik is a citizen of the Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians and serves as vice chair of the tribe’s child welfare commission. She currently sits on the board of directors for the National Indian Child Welfare Association, which hosts the largest annual conference on American Indian and Alaska Native child advocacy issues in the country. She is also vice president of the Michigan Indian Education Council, a nonprofit advocacy group concerned with Native American education across the state.

Ettawageshik retired from the State of Michigan as the director of Native American Affairs in the Child and Family Services Administration. In this position, she developed policies to improve services to American Indian families in Michigan. She also educated staff on key topics like Indigenous cultures and the Indian Child Welfare Act, to help them better understand and meet the needs of the population they served. Due to her background in social services, as well as her own family’s boarding school experiences, she is professionally and personally invested in Truth and Healing, seeking to address both the immediate and the long-term effects of U.S. Boarding School policy on Native American peoples.