Rio Rancho Schools Host 18th Annual Pow Wow, Celebrate Native Culture

A Rio Rancho High School gym became one of Sandoval County’s most visible public affirmations of Native identity on Saturday, as Rio Rancho Public Schools held its 18th annual powwow with dancers, drums, vendors and families from across the community.

The gathering brought together Native participants of all ages, with handcrafted drums echoing through the gym while vendors sold arts, crafts and food. RRPS says about 5.3% of its students are Native American, and the district enrolls students from all of New Mexico’s Native American tribes, along with tribes from across the nation and world.

District officials describe the powwow as more than a performance. RRPS says its purpose is to build community identification, celebrate intertribal connections and culturally enhance Rio Rancho. Rami Beautiful Bald Eagle, who served as head man, said powwows are meant to “gather, celebrate and have fun together,” and give tribes a way to share the same experience with American culture.

That sense of welcome is part of what gives the event its reach beyond Native families. Alaina Beautiful Bald Eagle said the powwow is “a place to learn” and told attendees to ask questions. She also said a family member who is an RRHS student learned about powwows by taking part in one for the first time, underscoring how the district event can educate even students already connected to RRPS.

The powwow also sits inside a broader Native American programming effort at RRPS. The district says that work includes a summer academy, a Native American pageant, senior recognition events and school-based liaisons. The pageant crowns Miss Indian, Brave, Jr. Miss Indian, Jr. Brave, Little Miss Indian and Little Brave, part of a structure the district says is meant to support the cultural and educational needs of Native children.

The event comes as Albuquerque’s Gathering of Nations, long billed as North America’s largest powwow, is set to end after 43 years. Its final weekend is scheduled for April 24-25 at Expo New Mexico’s Tingley Coliseum, and a University of New Mexico finance professor has estimated it generates about $30 million for Albuquerque. Against that backdrop, RRPS’s powwow stands out as a local anchor for Native cultural visibility in central New Mexico.

RRPS says the powwow is usually nonprofit and depends on donations, raffles and blanket dances for support. Each spring, the district says, one of its high school gymnasiums fills with drums, singing, dancing, fry bread and Indian tacos, keeping a school-based tradition alive in the middle of everyday public education.