Sandy White Hawk

Sandy White Hawk is a Sicangu Lakota adoptee from the Rosebud Reservation, South Dakota. She is the Founder and Director of the First Nations Repatriation Institute (FNRI).

FNRI is the first organization of its kind whose goal is to create a resource for First Nations people impacted by foster care or adoption to return home, reconnect, and reclaim their identity. The Institute also serves as a resource to enhance the knowledge and skills of practitioners who serve First Nations people.

White Hawk organizes Truth Healing Reconciliation Community Forums that bring together adoptees/fostered individuals and their families and professionals with the goal to identify post-adoption issues and to identify strategies that will prevent the removal of First Nations children. She has also initiated an ongoing support group for adoptees and birth relatives in the Twin Cities Area.

White Hawk is also the Elder in Residence at the Indian Child Welfare Law Office, Minneapolis, MN, and is a consultant for the Capacity Building Center for Tribes, Center for Regional and Tribal Child Welfare Studies University of Duluth, Minnesota. She serves on the boards of The Legal Rights Center of Minneapolis and The Association for American Indian Affairs.

White Hawk is a subject in three documentaries: "The People’s Protectors," "Dawnland" and "Blood Memory." She has received numerous awards She has received the following awards including The Child Welfare Leadership Award from the Center for Advanced Studies in Child Welfare at the University of Minnesota in 2019 and The National Indian Child Welfare Champion for Children Award in 2017.