A national educational accrediting organization has issued a sanction against Little Big Horn College in Crow Agency, citing “serious governance issues” and directing the institution to comply with multiple recommendations. If the college does not implement the recommended changes by specified deadlines, it could lose its accreditation, a certification standard often tied to federal funding.
Little Big Horn College (LBHC) was founded on the Crow Reservation in 1980, in part to help Crow community members overcome barriers to accessing higher education. The college is one of 37 tribal colleges and universities nationwide, and one of seven in Montana. It serves about 250 to 350 students each semester, the majority of whom are Crow. Students can earn associate degrees and take a variety of classes in Crow language and culture. The college employs more than 70 full-time staff members, according to the National Center for Education Statistics.
The college has experienced several leadership changes in recent years. In February 2024, a few months after 11 new board trustees were elected in a special election, the board unanimously voted to remove longtime President David Yarlott, citing a contract dispute. During the same meeting, the board appointed faculty member Neva Tall Bear as interim president. Two years later, in February 2026, the board removed Tall Bear and appointed Dean of Students Patricia Whiteman as interim president, according to a school report.
The Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities on Aug. 5 issued a “show cause sanction” to the college. A show cause notice is the most serious of three sanctions available to NWCCU, according to the organization’s website. It requires an institution to affirmatively demonstrate why its accreditation should not be withdrawn. Since 2019, just three institutions of the 159 that NWCCU oversees have received a show cause sanction, according to the organization.
In an Aug. 5 letter notifying Whiteman of the sanction, the NWCCU detailed concerns regarding the college’s governance, leadership, institutional effectiveness and financial reporting.
Accreditation is the process by which an independent institution evaluates a school to verify standards of quality. Without accreditation, institutions can be ineligible for certain federal and grant funding. Losing accreditation can also threaten a school’s perceived legitimacy among students, faculty and potential donors.
The cost of attending a tribal college in Montana is significantly lower than tuition at a Montana University System school. And studies show that tribal colleges act as economic drivers in their communities, providing essential workforce development and pathways to higher education. A 2025 American Indian Higher Education Consortium report found that the seven tribal colleges in Montana generated $322 million for the state’s economy and supported more than 5,000 jobs from 2022 to 2023.
Whiteman and three members of the Board of Trustees declined to offer comment for this story.
“A great deal is on the line,” said Janine Pease, LBHC’s founding president and adjunct faculty member.
“Before the college was here, very few people had college degrees, very few had GEDs,” she said. “It’s just changed the face of our nation. Now, that can change right back in a generation.”
Little Big Horn College, according to the Aug. 5 letter from NWCCU, must address four areas of concern regarding Board of Trustees roles, employee standards and finances by Aug. 5, 2029. The recommendations include:
- Establish and follow revised board policies that define roles, communication and governance.
- Ensure the college is staffed “by qualified administrators with appropriate authority, responsibility and accountability to manage the institution and its departments.”
- Employ staff “sufficient in role, number, and qualifications to achieve organizational responsibilities, educational objectives, and the integrity and continuity of student support services and academic programs.”
- Complete financial audits.
NWCCU also instructed Little Big Horn College to develop “teach-out” plans and agreements that outline continuing educational pathways for students if the institution were to close or eliminate programs. Teach-out agreements signed by leaders of participating institutions must be submitted to the NWCCU by early December. NWCCU also required the tribal college to notify current and prospective students of “the sanction and non-compliance.”
In a 28-page September report responding to the NWCCU, Little Big Horn College officials outlined their progress in addressing the concerns. The Board of Trustees adopted a new code of ethics in June and policy manual in August. The college said it hopes to create a new employee evaluation system by Dec. 31, and said it is exploring formalized methods of identifying staffing needs. The report says a fiscal year 2024 audit is in process and expected to be complete by December. An audit for fiscal year 2025 will begin after that.
“LBHC will not know its budget allowability for all staffing allocations until the FY 2025 audit is complete,” according to the report.
In an Aug. 10 letter posted to the college’s website, Interim President Whiteman wrote that college leaders take the sanction “very seriously.”
“We guarantee to work hard to resolve all issues of non-compliance,” she wrote.
On a Wednesday evening in late October, about a dozen community members packed into a room in the Little Big Horn College library. Several community leaders spoke about the severity of the show cause sanction.
“It’s a very serious matter,” said U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs Superintendent Harold J. Brien, who graduated from Little Big Horn College. “It needs to be addressed, and it needs to be addressed immediately. You guys only have a short window. And within that window, I’m willing to help any way I can.”
Whiteman reported during the meeting that the board “is on track” to meet NWCCU’s requirements, and several board members and Whiteman condemned what they described as rumors that the college is going to close.
“I just want to say we are not going to close,” Whiteman said at the meeting. “We have people who are helping us to ensure that we don’t get closed.”
Still, attendees said they are concerned about the college’s future, particularly given its role in the community.
“Little Big Horn College is the only college in the world that offers Crow language in a series,” said Pease, the founding president. “All of the courses in Crow studies — kinship, philosophy, Crow history, music and dance, the art of the Crow Indian — all of those courses would disappear, and this is the only place in the world that offers them.”
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