Sandi Berlin is the Indigenous Association’s inaugural Elder in Residence. 

She is enrolled in White Earth, My Dad was from the Red Lake Chippewas Tribe. I was later adopted into Blaine Wilson Family of the Sisseton Wahpeton Dakota Oyate. She is also a decedent of the Mdewakanton Sioux. From a young age, Sandi was immersed in community. Surrounded by knowledge carriers, she learned beadwork from her grandmother and while in the close knit homes of aunties, uncles, neighbors, friends, and elders, she watched closely, listened deeply, and learned the traditional cultural art of basket weaving and sewing. This early exposure gave her the strength, direction, purpose, and joy to thrive in a life marked by challenges.

As a child Sandi was a self-directed learner.  Because her formative years were spent in community, She recognized the value of her culture so that at even at an early age when she and three of her siblings were taken from her family and placed with a non-Indigenous foster family in a non-tribal community, she continued to seek out traditional cultural art and knowledge wherever she could find it. Sandie continued sewing while picking up new skills and honing new talents. Sandi taught herself to play guitar. She found solace and meaning in church membership, despite not always being welcomed by the non-Indigenous congregation. Following four years in foster care Sandi’s family endured poverty and moved frequently. Her early grounding in Indigenous culture and art helped preserve her sense of identity and purpose. As an introvert, she found peace in quiet solitude in art, working with her hands, nurturing her spirit. Despite  her unyielding resilience as she graduated from an all white highschool Sandi descended into drink.  

As an adult, wife, and young mother experienced a political and personal awakening. Motivated by a desire to create a better life for her children, she began engaging in community organizing. Her drive to grow and strengthen herself returned her to the Indigenous culture and community from which she had been severed from. This moment marked the start of a new journey, to sobriety with the Red Road to Recovery at the old Native American Center in Fargo. Much like the Indigenous Association today, the old Indian Center hosted drum groups, meetings, courses, and community organizations that reconnected her to an Indigenous community and teachings that had once guided her.

Sandi returned to school. She began to find and build community in Fargo, discovering good medicine and Indigenous outreach. She led recovery meetings and weekly meetings of all sort allowed her to connect meaningfully with others who valued Indigenous culture and practice. Friendships grew into kinship, spanning across the tri state region. Her renewed sense of community sparked a deep desire to serve others, particularly the unhoused Indigenous population.

One winter evening, as she drove her children and another woman home from the center, Sandi saw an Indigenous man walking across a parking lot. He was passing under an overpass, all his worldly belongings carried in a garbage bag slung over his shoulder. She was struck by the image and haunted by memories of the stories she had heard in foster care about “savage” Indigenous people. But what she saw in that moment was not savagery. Sandi recognized systemic poverty, despair, and the generational impact of displacement and intentional exclusion from opportunity.  She wanted to run to the man. She wanted to restore him to his rightful dignity.

That winter was especially cold. Without shelter, Indigenous men, women, and children were freezing to death. Sandi realized that this crisis mirrored the dire conditions on the reservation. Called to action, she began using her community networks, organizing committees, and friends groups to raise awareness of Indigenous homelessness. She hoped others would see what she saw. She hoped others would join her in helping families access food and shelter.

Unlike many, Sandi understood the generational toll of homelessness and how it played out across mothers and daughters in a downward chain. Her own history gave her insight into the devastating cycle of poverty and the loss of children to the foster care system. As her life took on new meaning Sandi was adopted by Elder Bane Wilson and welcomed into the Dakota Sisseton Wahpeton community. Through this relationship and the guidance of Elders and Alcoholics Anonymous, she began forging a new path.

Sandi met amazing people with remarkable potential, but they lacked access to basic needs, sometimes as simple as a meal. Once again, she returned to the cultural practices that had sustained her through so much. From Bane’s guidance  she grounded herself in the teachings of the medicine wheel, the four directions, and the elements. She sought balance in her own life while looking for ways to help others by sharing what she knew.

Her connection to animals, especially buffalo and eagles, her music, her recovery, and her participation in sweat lodge ceremonies reaffirmed her strength. The Elders who mentored her shaped the next phase of her life. She dedicated herself to learning and sharing, to teaching and continuing the circle of intergenerational knowledge. The medicine wheel would guide her forward with its emphasis on sobriety, teaching, and service. Her adopted father Bane Wilson reminded her that at any point in life, one can commit to the circle. And with every lesson learned, she understood the importance of leaving something behind, whether tobacco, a prayer, or a gift. Learning is not meant to be kept to oneself. It is to be shared, with gratitude, in equal measure.

These teachings strengthened Sandi’s resolve and her commitment to community. Through talking circles, sweat lodge ceremonies, and community action, she became a trusted leader.  Working as a consultant for the City of Fargo Sandi set the groundwork for the pilot program for the Gladys Ray Shelter and continued her work until Fargo took over the shelter.   Her insights and compassion continue to make her an essential presence where she works today at the Downtown Engagement Center.  There she supports unhoused individuals and helps them reconnect with culture, dignity, and balance.

Today, Sandi is the mother of four, the grandmother of fourteen, and the great-grandmother of five. She has worked for the White Earth tribal court,  and All Nations’s Youth Group. She is a respected Elder and a vital source of Indigenous knowledge, culture, and tradition. After years of volunteer work with the Indigenous Association, we are deeply honored to have her now serving in the formal role of Elder in Residence where she can continue her commitment to sharing her knowledge.