Ms.Harlan is a member of the EBCI and serves as the Tribal Historian.

Mr. Mink is executive director of UNC-Chapel Hill’s LEARN NC. He will lead the Institute’s exploration into the vast collection of digital resources that document Cherokee history and American Indian removal.

Ms. Dugan, a member of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians, has an extensive background in education and served for five years as Superintendent of the Cherokee Central Schools. In 1995, she ran for and won the office of Principal Chief of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians. She is the first woman to hold this office and to date, the only woman to hold this office. During her tenure as Chief, the tribe recovered the property on which the “mother town” of Kituwah was located.

Mr. Belt is the WCU Cherokee Language Program Coordinator; he is working to create a state-of-the-art Cherokee language program at the university level. Mr. Belt teaches the first four semesters of Cherokee language and he co-teaches courses on Cherokee grammar and Cherokee language literature. Mr. Belt, a citizen of the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma, is a fluent Cherokee speaker and works closely with speakers from the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians to produce culturally-based Cherokee language learning material. Before joining the Cherokee Language Program, Mr.

Ms. Belt is director of the Western Carolina University–Cherokee Center. Born in Cherokee, NC, and an enrolled member of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians (EBCI), Belt has been director of the Cherokee Center since June, 2001. She received her bachelor’s degree in history from the University of Colorado at Boulder, where she worked for 10 years as a University counselor, and earned her master’s degree in counseling and consulting psychology from Harvard University's Graduate School of Education. Upon returning to Cherokee, she received certification in school counseling from WCU.

Dr. Eastman is an associate professor of anthropology at Western Carolina University and director of the Cherokee Studies Program. She received her Ph.D. from the UNC-Chapel Hill. Her research interests include Native American societies of the Southeastern United States, particularly community organization, gender relations, pottery analysis, and culture contact studies.