While TaShena Sams, 37, may have started in her new role as Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians’ (GTB) cultural department assistant/ director in November, she’s been working for the tribe for 22 years now and counting.
After being employed by GTB for most of her life, she said she couldn’t see herself working anywhere else.
“This is my home and community, and I really want my community to have its best, give its best, be able to provide its best,” Sams said. “Our culture is just so enriched and I just feel like we need people to keep being able to provide that. I grew up with a lot of it and centered around it through my parents and my family members.”
Sams said her mother, Tanya, and father, Paul Raphael, used to run the GTB youth program when she was growing up. As she got older, she followed in her parents footsteps and ended up applying for the tribe’s office manager position within the youth program, and slowly worked through different positions during that time until she took on the youth services director role in 2015. Just across the street from the youth services building in Peshawbestown was her family’s food truck, “Raphael Foods.”
“My parents did this for me, ran the youth program and multiple programs within the tribe,” she said. “My dad is very into our culture and was able to provide a lot for myself, but also to my community, so it’s kind of like I’m able to give back that way. We’re that next generation carrying on what our parents and grandparents did, so that’s really cool, too.”
Through youth paid job opportunities, Sams began working for the GTB when she was just 14-years-old. Although the jobs were small, herself and other youth around her age were able to register and log hours down for their work, which helped give her a running start with the tribe.
“I started working here pretty young… I’ve worked with lots of people because the tribe is constantly growing and people are always coming and going,” she said. “Families around here know me as the person to go to for anything with the youth.”
With the traditional knowledge Sams holds as well as her decades of work experience, she’ll be using her skills to collaborate with others in the department to implement innovative ideas moving forward.
“This is more broad (the job) and you get to work with everyone, so instead of just being subject to youth, I get to work with all ages,” she said. “I’m just really excited to be able to have the opportunity to work here for my tribe and even my community outside of the tribe. It’s really important that everyone else around understands us and the culture. We’re just a new generation that is able to take the next steps in providing and passing on our culture and traditions.”
Sams was born in Grand Rapids, but her family moved to Peshawbestown when she was a child, so all of her memories are from her time living in the area. Herself and five siblings also lived in Northport for a bit, the town where her father Paul was from, and where Sams attended school until her senior year when she transferred to Suttons Bay Public School and graduated as part of the class of 2004. Her family has lived in Leelanau County for the last 30 years.
Today, Sams is raising her own family of three children, her son, Maiingan, and twin daughters, Faith and Hope. The new position is keeping her busier than ever, Sams said, but choosing between both her youth services and cultural department jobs was a difficult decision. She hopes focusing her work in the cultural department will allow her to keep providing traditional activities for all community members and the public for certain events, whether that be through school visits or presentations. However, one of her main goals is to offer opportunities for local families to learn and participate in tribal cultural activities like the kind provided to her when she was growing up.
“I want to continue having that (the same opportunities) available so the next generation can keep getting that. I feel like as we get older and the tribe grows, we are gearing away from some of that stuff,” she said. “It’s another reason why I don’t go (job-wise) anywhere else because it is important, and without our culture, we wouldn’t have our tribe and we wouldn’t be able to be who we are.”
