After Dr. Richard A. Caulfield graduated from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1973, he was certain that his interests in anthropology and natural resource management would ultimately take him to Alaska.
However, Caulfield, who grew up in the San Francisco Bay area, had no idea that he would eventually emerge as one of Alaska’s most recognized leaders in higher education for his innovative approach to educating college students.
“I was young and interested in exploring Alaska,” says Caulfield, who took the helm as chancellor of the University of Alaska Southeast — a public four-year college that has nearly 4,000 students —in 2015.
Prior to his appointment as chancellor, Caulfield served as the provost and executive dean at UAS, where he first received accolades for his advocacy work on behalf of Native Alaskan students.
“They are the original people of this place where we live,” he says matter-of-factly, adding that the university’s campus is located on ancestral territory. “I’m very mindful that our campus has an obligation to serve all people, but especially the indigenous people of this land.”
That cultural awareness for the plight of the Alaskan native peoples has always been important to Caulfield and was fueled in his early years. Shortly after graduating from Berkeley, he worked for five years in some of Alaska’s more remote and indigenous communities. It was in these settings that he learned from the Native American — or Native Alaskan — elders.
“Fresh from California, this gave me a perspective about Alaska that was totally different than what I had anticipated,” says Caulfield in an interview with Diverse. He recalls working with the elders of a local tribe on maps of the indigenous place names of local mountains, lakes and rivers.
