Advancing Tribal Gaming Through Higher Education

A history of the Sycuan Institute on Tribal Gaming at SDSU

By Dr. Kate Spilde

The Sycuan Institute on Tribal Gaming (SITG) was established in the L. Robert Payne School of Hospitality and Tourism Management (HTM) at San Diego State University (SDSU) by the Sycuan Band of the Kumeyaay Nation in 2006 for two primary purposes.

First, the Sycuan Band created the SITG to assure quality educational opportunities on tribal government gaming and to support professional development for gaming employees who wanted a career in the thriving tribal gaming industry. At that time, Sycuan leadership was disturbed that there were a number of training courses around the country of dubious quality that were being presented by people unfamiliar with what differentiated tribal government gaming from other industry segments.

This lack of access to quality programs meant that employees of tribal gaming facilities were likely to have been trained in a “Las Vegas model” of casino operations and regulation or not trained at all. The Sycuan Band decided to take the lead in order to maintain a credible and professional presence for tribal government gaming, ultimately benefiting employees, customers and the industry as a whole.

Secondly, the Sycuan Band was interested in creating a research center that would focus on the social and economic impacts of the tribal gaming industry, including its effects on tribal and non-tribal communities, governments, employees and guests. By supporting the creation of a clearinghouse on independent academic research about tribal government gaming, the Sycuan Band committed to collaborating, funding and promoting the academic research produced and supported by the SITG.

The institute’s first public event was held in San Diego in April 2008, at the annual meeting of the National Indian Gaming Association (NIGA) to evaluate and honor the first 20 years of the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act (IGRA).

The SITG has pursued three mandates based upon feedback from that first event: 1) developing and offering the nation’s first four-year degree program (B.S. in Hospitality and Tourism Management) in tribal casino operations management; 2) producing and supporting academic research on tribal gaming; and 3) informing the public policy debate around tribal government gaming and its impacts on individuals and communities.

With the support of our gaming industry partners, the institute is demonstrating a shared commitment to the long-term goal of developing a professional class of gaming experts who will enhance the tribal government gaming industry across the United States.

The Sycuan Institute at Present

San Diego County is home to 17 federally recognized tribal governments and hosts 10 tribal gaming facilities with a range of amenities. Therefore, the SITG has a unique position in the contemporary gaming and educational environment. Because of our location, the SITG, through its relationship with the Sycuan Band, other local tribes and the tribal government gaming industry, has access to world-class tribal and casino staff, lawyers and lobbyists, marketing and public relations experts, gaming regulators, gaming commissioners and other experts.

This local pool of talent provides a wealth of knowledge from an experiential, rather than simply academic, perspective. The SITG’s relationship with SDSU, and its location in the HTM Program in particular, provides additional access to academic experts and industry leaders in hospitality, cultural heritage tourism, event planning, food and beverage and hotel management, among others.

These connections have resulted in the building of a new field of academic research into tribal gaming. The SITG research agenda is always driven by tribal government and industry needs, input and collaboration. For example, tribal compact negotiations and legislative efforts require indepth analysis and description of the economic, social and cultural impacts of tribal gaming including investments in language revitalization, educational gains, repatriation and self representation in tribal museums, best practices in tribal responsible gaming, and employee engagement and retention, as well as tribal philanthropy and nation (re)building efforts generally.

The SITG has also created a new field of tribal casino operations research with deep dives into topics ranging from the return on free play investments, the impact of slot hold percentages and the effects of non-smoking constraints on tribal gaming revenues. This research supports the industry but also supplements the course work in the academic program.

The five courses developed by the SITG cover a range of topics unique to tribal gaming, such as:

AMIND/HTM 370 Tribal Gaming: Cultural and Political Contexts

HTM 371 Tribal Gaming: Casino Operations Management

HTM 372 Tribal Gaming: Legal and Regulatory Issues

HTM 373 Tribal Gaming: Casino Marketing and Tribal Public Relations

HTM 381 Cross-Cultural Interpretations of Gambling Addiction

Certificate In Tribal Casino Operations Management Moves Online

After more than a decade of development and growth on our campus in San Diego, the SITG began offering fully online classes in tribal gaming during the pandemic shift to remote learning. This expansion of the program’s geography has resulted in creation of a separate SITG Certificate in Tribal Casino Operations Management, in addition to the bachelor of science degree program completed on campus.

The certificate program was developed in direct response to tribal gaming industry requests for access to higher education training in casino operations, marketing and regulation.

Partnership with the Online AIS Degree Completion Program

The pandemic move to remote learning revealed academic gaps across disciplines and geographies. At SDSU, the SITG has addressed these gaps by partnering with the American Indian Studies Department and Global Studies to embed the Tribal Casino Operations Management Certificate into the new American Indian Studies Degree completion program offered fully online.

This new bachelor of arts in SDSU’s American Indian Studies major is a self-paced degree-completion program designed to be completed within 24 months. The use of an online modality facilitates program completion in two years or less and the number of units required will vary based on each students’ total units transferred into the program.

The program was designed specifically with tribal nations in mind since many tribal students have access to community and tribal college-level education but are unable to attend a university in a face-to-face capacity due to location and distance. In many parts of Indian Country, geographic isolation inhibits student’s ability to earn a bachelor’s degree and earn a respective bachelor’s level income.

Extending Tribal Education Partnerships into Indian Country

In order to extend the reach of the certificate program developed by the SITG into Indian Country, the Sycuan Band and the SITG created our first memorandum of understanding (MOU) with the Red Lake Nation College (RLNC) in Minnesota. The goals of this affiliation are to provide a combination of breadth, depth and quality of curriculum, experience and purpose that neither institution could achieve on its own, and to expand opportunities for students in both regions and at both institutions.

This partnership was forged through a combination of tribal leadership, academic partners and industry executives, including Sycuan Tribal Chairman Cody Martinez, RLNC President Dan King, Red Lake Nation Gaming CEO Angela Dauphinais, SITG Endowed Chair Kate Spilde and AIS Chair David Kamper. The timing of the launch was symbolic since the Sycuan Band of the Kumeyaay celebrated the inauguration of their new tribal council in San Diego on Saturday, January 28, and met with leaders of the Red Lake Nation and RLNC in their council chambers first thing Monday morning, January 30, to learn more about the ways this partnership can support both nations and all of Indian Country.

Signed on campus at SDSU later the same day, the MOU is intended to accomplish a number of concrete objectives. In the short term, faculty in AIS and the SITG will support the RLNC to facilitate student participation in the online AIS degree completion program at SDSU to include the Certificate in Tribal Casino Operations Management offered by the SITG.

In addition, the RLNC will work with AIS and SITG to determine tribal gaming education and training needs specific to Red Lake Gaming in order to

(l to r): Tami Niswander, CFO of RLNC; Nadine Bill, director of assessment and institutional effectiveness, RLNC; Mandy Schram, vice president of operations and academic affairs, RLNC; Dan King, president, RLNC and hereditary chief of Red Lake Nation, RLNC; David Kamper, chair and professor, American Indian studies, SDSU assess whether current offerings are meeting industry, student and workforce development needs. We will also work together to provide exchange opportunities for students at each institution to visit and/or work at other tribal gaming properties to appreciate the diversity of tribal gaming facilities across Indian Country.

In the long term, our shared goal is to create a self-perpetuating pathway that allows for students graduating from RLNC to complete their B.A. at SDSU fully online while they are able to live and work in their chosen community. Ultimately, we plan to collect and distribute data about this successful education collaboration that can be mobilized for public consumption and in ongoing public policy debates related to tribal gaming education, research and improved gaming operations.

Future partnership exploration includes curriculum development in indigenous-focused education and food sovereignty that bridges Indian County community needs, indigenous foods and the tribal gaming industry in partnership with groups like the North American Indigenous Traditional Indigenous Food Systems (NATIFS) organization.

Conclusion

Leaders at tribal nations like Sycuan and Red Lake and educational institutions like SDSU and the RLNC are demonstrating that strategic partnerships like this one can improve business performance through strengthening gaming management resources. Affiliation also increases the depth and breadth of the academic research component of the gaming industry, including the SITG’s ability to fund independent research that addresses marketing, operations and regulation of current and future gaming opportunities across Indian Country.

Finally, this affiliation supports tribal students and communities by bridging the geographic divide between tribal nations and facilitating deep and enduring knowledge sharing and success.

Dr. Kate Spilde is a professor and endowed chair of the Sycuan Institute on Tribal Gaming at San Diego State University. She has worked with tribal governments on economic development and gaming for more than 20 years and serves on the Board of Directors for the International Center for Responsible Gaming.