Humboldt State University
Forestry Hydrology
The Pit River Nation comprises 11 autonomous bands — nine are Ajumawi “Pit River,” and two are Hat Creek “Atsuge.” Ajumawi are a northeastern California tribe that excels both at fishing and at managing this important natural resource. The name Ajumawi means “River People.”
FORMER HIGH SCHOOL DROPOUT Christopher Villarruel is about to graduate with a BS in forest hydrology. He gives a lot of credit for his personal turnaround to the grandmother who raised him. “My grandmother, Lillian Lego, was a very strong woman,” he says. “She was Ajumawi and Atsuge on her mother’s side and Madesi on her father’s side. She raised many of us grandchildren, and some of my first cousins are just like my siblings.”
Villarruel stuck with high school until age 15, then he dropped out after an unsuccessful period of home schooling. “At that point I was falling to the pressures that many tribal youths endure,” he explains. “Alcohol and other destructive forces were affecting me.” Even though he earned his GED at 19, Villarruel didn’t start taking junior college courses until he was 24. “I was out of school for almost a decade,” he explains. “That was a big hurdle for me mentally because I had many doubts about my ability to cut it.”
Like all students, he also had to learn how to balance his personal life. “Learning the hard way resulted in some failed classes and a one-year departure from school,” he says. “In 2017, I graduated with my associate’s in natural science. That was the first time I had ever walked in a ceremony for graduation. My grandmother passed away in 2016, but I feel like she was there in spirit.”
Villarruel’s grandmother had made his next step clear. “My grandmother could see past the struggles I was having, and she believed strongly that I should attend Humboldt State,” he says. “I remember talking to her about compromising on another college. She gave me some choice words that only a loving grandma could. Fast-forward to the present — she was right. Next year, I will be walking for a BS in forestry.”
These days Villarruel also looks to his immediate family for motivation and support. “My sons Talon and Cirrus are a driving factor in my pursuit of higher education,” he says. “But it’s not easy being a full-time dad while pursuing a difficult area of study. Luckily, my girlfriend holds it down at home. As a family, they are fully supportive of the time and sacrifice I put into school and work.”
Villarruel says he chose the hydrology option for his forestry major for more than just professional reasons — it also neatly fits his heritage. “My people (Ajumawi) are river people,” he explains. “As a tribal forester, it is important for me to base my future work on watershed health. Even though the hydrology program takes longer to finish due to more math requirements, I feel like I chose the right option.”
“My people (Ajumawi) are river people,” Villarruel explains. “As a tribal forester, it is important for me to base my future work on watershed health.”
Humboldt State University, with its programs for Native students students, including the Indian Tribal & Educational Personnel Program (ITEPP), provides academic support and advisement from Native staff members. On the other side of campus resides Humboldt’s Indian Natural Resources, Science and Engineering Program (INRSEP), where students can access academic and research support services. INRSEP focuses on first-generation, low-income, and historically underrepresented students in STEM disciplines, especially Indigenous students. Both houses create the perfect balance of support that a student like Villarruel needs to feel comfortable four hours away from his homeland.
Humboldt was also a good choice for Villarruel. Through a fire ecology club on campus, Villarruel connected with the Cultural Fire Management Council’s fall training exchange, or TREX, and had an opportunity to learn about prescription burning. “This past October I had the pleasure of setting fire to the ground with the Yurok Tribe,” he says. “Our job was to assist in burning and clearing areas near Weitchpec. I was able to apply what I learned in my classes to a real-life situation. As a Native forester, it was a special experience: rekindling my relationship with fire.” (For more on cultural fire management.)
This past summer he was hired through an apprenticeship on campus for Redwoods Rising, a program where participants work on their own in the wilderness with management objectives. “The project means a lot to me because it was my first field job while pursuing my forestry degree,” says Villarruel. “At the end of the project my partner and I presented our work to a room full of professors, agency leads, and cohorts. That job will forever have a place in my heart — and on my resume.”
Now, when Villarruel graduates he will have his degree and three summers of experience, which fits right into his goals. “I want to work under a registered professional forester (RFP) and gain two more years of forestry experience,” he says. “Next, I want to earn a master’s in sustainable forest management at Oregon State. I’m going to take the RFP test. Then I want to start up a natural resource management LLC to offer sustainable forest and hydrology management services to tribal and non-tribal projects.”
This high school dropout has come a long way. “I know what it feels like to fall short and fail,” he says. “That feeling doesn’t sit well with me anymore. Now I know when to take an opportunity, and I don’t wait for people to advocate for me.” And his grandmother? He says, “She would be thrilled to know how things have turned out.”
—Kyle Coulon
Co-founder, ReFigure
Cherokee was one of the first American Indian languages to have a system of writing. Devised by Cherokee scholar Sequoyah, the symbols are not technically an alphabet, but rather a syllabary, with each “letter” representing a syllable rather than a consonant or vowel.
THE SAME MONTH WHEN Joe Akin was set to defend his PhD dissertation in Boston, his grandmother was to be honored on her 100th birthday in Oklahoma. Akin really wanted to be there, but didn’t see how he could manage the time or finances to make the trip possible. His brother wisely reminded him there was no way he was not coming, and together they managed to get Akin there to witness the ceremonial presentation of a Cherokee communal handsewn quilt to his grandmother.
When Akin was growing up, his grandmother was his primary source of the history and stories that fed his inclination to serve his community and reconnect with his Cherokee identity. In high school, he represented his hometown of Claremore on the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma Tribal Youth Council.
To Akin, the coolest science happening now runs across disciplines and technologies. That’s why he is passionate about ReFigure’s mission to break down barriers and make information more accessible and transparent.
Akin’s grandmother also was his best teacher on how to live. “She embodied, for me, this idea of balance — balance within yourself and balancing yourself with the external world,” Akin says. “I always think about her wisdom when I face tough challenges.”
One of his first challenges was in high school when he set his sights on attending either the Air Force Academy or the Naval Academy. He navigated the competitive admissions and testing processes and was accepted at both institutions. He chose the Air Force Academy because he thought its technology, science, and engineering all seemed much cooler. Following the “coolest science” became a theme for Akin in his educational and professional pursuits.
He excelled at the academy, earning a BS in chemistry in 2003, and was deemed eligible by the Air Force to attend graduate school. He earned his master’s in materials science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2005.
At the same time, Akin continued his service as a scientist in the Air Force. He worked on Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) initiatives, and one really captured his imagination. The project focused on a special set of genes that could identify a person by odor, and that led Akin to become intrigued by the complexity of the immune system. He thought if he ever went back to school for advanced studies, it would be in immunology, a field where his research and output in the lab could be translated into human applications and improved patient outcomes.
After completing his military service, Akin began working on his PhD in immunology at Harvard University. He became part of a team that worked on new discoveries and translatable technologies for cancer patients.
He also was influenced by Harvard’s President’s Innovation challenge, an event that kicked off the opening of the university’s new Innovation Lab. The Challenge was the genesis of Akin’s working relationship outside the lab with a fellow PhD student, Dr. Girija Goyal. They did not win the competition, but their conversations about problems they saw in translational science, and whether any of these were interesting enough to build a company around, fueled their entrepreneurial spirit.
Taking a scientist’s approach to becoming entrepreneurs, experimenting to find out what works and what doesn’t, the duo created ReFigure. Akin describes the ReFigure platform as a sort of Pinterest for scientists and engineers. “Our main selling point is that it unshackles scientific communication,” he says. “It’s not meant to replace scientific publications, but to complement them. And it’s meant to bring new people into the discussion and promote partnerships, and that can lead to increased discoveries.”
To Akin, the coolest science happening now runs across disciplines and technologies. That’s why he is passionate about ReFigure’s mission to break down barriers and make information more accessible and transparent. He explains, “We want to find new and interesting ways to use ReFigure to communicate science the right way through the right channels to the right people.”
—Ann Boor