Many students say romanticization of Native Americans and assumptions of their poverty and ignorance need to disappear before Americans in general can understand Native American issues.
"What you learn in the American school system is out of date," Egan says. "Native peoples are rebuilding nations, and I don't know if people know that."
"It's the nature of popular culture to continuously view Natives in the past tense," Begay says, adding that with such misconceptions, even well-meaning people need "a certain amount of education before receptiveness becomes a reality."
So the Native Americans at Harvard seek the University's support. They say they don't look for individual endorsement, but rather for acknowledgment of their people's place in both the fore-ground and background of the United States.
"The main thing I would want," Wilson says, "is for the University to recognize that we are here, that we are always going to be here, and that Harvard is built on a land that we come from. Just that recognition would change a lot of things."
Connected both to the Native American and the Harvard communities, students say they will continue to push for recognition from educators, legislators and the general public.
"My generation is the first generation which has had the opportunity for a full higher education," Begay says. "Things are changing tremendously now."
Harvard's students hope to continue changing things. After all, there is work to be done in Indian Country, and no one told this generation that it would be easy.