Lynn Braveheart

Lynn Braveheart is a member of the Oglala Lakota Nation of Pine Ridge, South Dakota. She brings over 25 years of experience in tribal, state, and nonprofit systems and serves on both the Minnesota American Indian Child Welfare Advisory Council and the Minnesota Supreme Court’s Advisory Council on Child Protection Reform. She currently serves as the ICWA Division Program Manager for the State of Minnesota Guardian ad Litem Program. Lynn leads statewide efforts to strengthen compliance with the Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA) and the Minnesota Indian Family Preservation Act (MIFPA), with a deep commitment to protecting the rights of Native children and honoring the vital importance of keeping families together As a Community Organizer, Lynn worked on environmental health and housing policy initiatives in Minneapolis helping to influence the city’s inspections to include an environmental health checklist.  

Lynn’s work is profoundly influenced by her lived experience: her mother was forcibly adopted into a white home in Minnesota before the passage of ICWA, as part of the broader history of Indian child removal and assimilation. Lynn was a child of the foster care system. She experienced traditional and institutional foster care and aged out at 18. These personal and intergenerational experiences fuel her commitment to advocacy, healing, and systems change. 
 
In March 2025, Lynn was recognized as a Distinguished Alumna by the University of Minnesota Duluth’s College of Education and Human Service Professions (CEHSP), a prestigious honor celebrating her exceptional leadership in tribal and child welfare systems. She earned her Master of Social Work from UMD as an ICWA Scholar.

In 2024, the ICWA Division she leads was awarded a competitive ICWA Best Practices grant from the Children’s Bureau at the Administration for Children and Families (ACF), in collaboration with the UMD Tribal Training and Certification Partnership and White Earth Nation, to research ICWA Guardian ad Litem work as an evidence-based best practice. She was also honored by the American Bar Association as a Reunification Hero. Her leadership is grounded in Indigenous values, racial justice, and healing-centered practices that elevate family preservation as a cornerstone of child well-being.