Today, Shelton is immersed in a five-year strategic plan that actively integrates and promotes Skokomish and Squaxin Island culture in the school and the non-Native community at large. Late in 2006, for example, nearly 300 Shelton teachers, administrators and classroom aides attended a daylong seminar that introduced them to the Squaxin Island's heritage, values and world view. In short, a true partnership has emerged, one that includes CNE, the area tribes, the school system and the community.

That partnership effort has been supported by a Lumina Foundation grant, which CNE has used to start a companion program to Early College called New Path. While the Early College model enables students to graduate from high school with both a diploma and an associate's degree, New Path makes the degree accessible to students' adult family members – an innovation that was suggested by members of the Native community, and one that fits perfectly with the intergenerational learning style that is rooted in tribal tradition. Through small classes that give students lots of one-on-one time with instructors – and often with respected elders – New Path taps into the potential of low-income students who aspire to become the first in their families to attend college.

At Olympic College in Shelton, New Path's intergenerational learning model involves students ranging in age from 16 to Austin Littlesun's age – 51. The Shelton campus, one of three Olympic locations spread around Puget Sound, honors the area's Native heritage with "longhouse buildings" designed in the tradition of the Skokomish and Squaxin Island tribes. Providing quality education in basic math, English, computers and physical education is the primary objective of Shelton's New Path effort. But the program's on-campus director, Kim McNamara, also hopes it will foster the academic skills and habits that appeal to local employers. Such efforts are vital in a region where jobs are evolving from fishing and logging to service-oriented casino, governmental and high-tech positions requiring proficiency in math and English.

The students who trickled into Olympic classrooms this summer spanned the chronological and academic spectrums. There was 16-year-old Bailey Higgs, a shy Shelton junior who enrolled in college-level classes because her high school courses failed to challenge her. As a dual-enrollment student, Bailey turned to New Path/Early College to get a "running start" on college by earning course credits before enrolling as a full-time college student.

There were James Runnels and his sister Randee, who arrived with their family in Shelton six years ago after a roundabout journey that began on an Oglala Sioux reservation in South Dakota and ran through several states. For James, 21, the English and math courses were a way to prepare him for a return to education, hopefully at the University of Washington and, beyond that, a business career. For Randee, a home-schooled 18-year-old, New Path/Early College was a first step toward college and a career as a sports photographer.

Then there was Nolin Sadlier, a Shelton junior who came to Olympic for what can best be described as credit retrieval. In three years of high school, Nolin never passed an English class. On the verge of dropping out, thereby ending all hope of one day becoming a police officer, Nolin enrolled at Olympic – pushed there by his parents and school officials. To his surprise, the college turned out to be a perfect fit.

"I'm straightening out, and I'm working on school now," he says. "I like it.... I've never done this well in an English class. I'm actually getting my work done and not putting my head on the desk and falling asleep."

As campus director, Kim McNamara became the poster child for multi-tasking, simultaneously serving as an administrator, academic counselor, instructor, logistics coordinator (for the student in a family that could claim no one with a legal driver's license) and social worker (for the student who required a mentor to see to it that she arrived on time for class each day).