Aleesia Dillon accepted at Ivy League school

RAPID CITY—Even the worst poker player in the world beats the best poker player in the world if he gets dealt a royal flush. Most Lakota start out in life with a pair of deuces, and Aleesia Dillon started out with even less than that. However difficult her formative years were, by the time she reached middle school, there was enough structure and stability in her life that her innate talents for hard work and perseverance had the chance to be refined and recognized. Recently graduated from Stevens High School, Aleesia has been accepted at Cornell University.

Getting into a prestigious Ivy League school is no small feat for any student, and less so for a Lakota from rural South Dakota, with no legacy connection, and no family fortune.

“I think Aleesia’s story is inspiring to other Native students to shoot for the stars,” said stepfather Dana Hanna, a Rapid City attorney. “She’s going to an Ivy League college, and they can do it, too. But one of the more important aspects of the story is it can’t be done alone. Iris (Aleesia’s mother) was so dedicated in helping her do this. When you apply to any top school it’s a matter of how to stand out, because all those kids who apply to these schools are smart, and they’re all hard workers, and they all have good grades, and so how do you become one of the X percent that get accepted? Aleesia stands out right off the bat. She’s a Lakota from South Dakota, she’s a lot different than a lot of those students.”

Being Lakota, in and of itself, not only won’t open many doors for you, it tends to get them slammed shut. But when you add it to good grades and hard work, the deficit becomes an asset, particularly when you have family support, and you all work together as a team. The most important part of that work begins with a stable home environment where the child feels safe and appreciated, where supportive adult authority figures reward the hard work by exploring the options for success. In Aleesia’s case, Iris and Dana helped get her into the New York Times summer academy, A Million Lives in the Law, when she was fifteen years old. This was a two-week course in the Big Apple, two weeks alone in the world’s most famous city, the City That Never Sleeps.

“I doubted myself, into being able to be accepted into like a prestigious school like Cornell,” Aleesia said. “So, I never really considered it like an option for me.”

But after the New York Times opportunity, Aleesia’s perception of possibilities was ratcheted way up.

“She met a lot of these kids, who are ambitious kids from the east,” Dana said.

Aleesia became friends with some of these kids, and their parents went to major schools, and they expected their kids to go to major schools. Given her difficult start in life, it is surprising how doors opened for Aleesia once she did the hard work to belong with high achievers, and once her family helped her chart a course to best realize her aspirations.

To get into Cornell, Aleesia needed more than good grades and connections, she had to write an essay, explaining who she was, and what she wanted from life. Most Ivy League students come from privilege so they must creatively enhance their essay to make it compelling. But Aleesia’s essay was raw and authentic.

“When I was eight, my mom, younger sister and I escaped an abusive household in Kadoka, SD,” she wrote. “My mom was a victim of domestic abuse by my younger sister’s father.”

During this time, Aleesia lived with a foster family, and the custody battle for her younger sister ended up in court. Twelve-year-old Aleesia’s testimony was critical in getting her sister Alayna returned to Iris.

“It was extremely challenging to discuss the abuse my mother and I had gone through,” Aleesia wrote in the essay. “I spoke of the horrible actions that he put us through while he was watching me in that small courtroom. I was emotional because I was the only eyewitness to her abuse…the trial taught me several life lessons and I learned a lot from watching my mom be a victim of domestic abuse.”

Aleesia saved most of her praise for her mother: “She found the courage and bravery to take her daughters and herself out of an abusive, toxic household. My mom realized that she needed to make a change for her daughters to live a better life. The way she carried herself during our circumstances inspired me to be courageous and brave while I was testifying in court. My situation has inspired me to also be courageous and brave with any challenge that I may face.”

Aleesia said her foster parents, Luke and Wanda Vander May of Kadoka were instrumental in her growth as a person: “This change to a structured home taught me responsibility within a family and ranch.”

The NY Times program was not enough on its own. Another program provided the impetus to clear the last hurdle to getting into an Ivy League school.

“College Horizons is specifically geared toward Native high school students,” Dana said, “to help them get into a competitive college, understand what the process is like.”

From the College Horizons website: “College Horizons is a non-profit organization that supports the higher education of Native American students by providing college and graduate admissions workshops to American Indian, Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian students/participants from across the nation.”

Normally students attend the five-day course in whatever city is chosen, but because of COVID restrictions, Aleesia had to zoom with her peers remotely.”

“When Lisa applied to the College Horizons program,” Iris said, “they only accepted 200 students from all across the world.”

“They said apply to ten colleges,” Aleesia said, “and then apply to certain schools as a safety school, and then your reach schools, which are like Ivy League schools, and the harder schools to get into, so just in case you didn’t get into those reach schools, you have a safety school to fall back on.”

As it turns out, Lisa was placed on the wait list for acceptance to Colorado College, but after College Horizons, and the strategy she learned there, and the connections she made, she got into Cornell.

Although her essay ends with her expressing interest in the law, Aleesia isn’t sure what path she will take once she gets to Cornell: “My major is undecided, but I do want to minor in American Indian Studies. I’m glad I didn’t decide (on my major) yet, because I can explore a whole bunch of classes at Cornell, like what really interests me.”

Aleesia sees her acceptance to Cornell as a chance to provide a better future for her kids, and then their kids.

“I think it’s important that she come back to our tribe and help our people,” Iris said.

(Contact James Giago Davies at skindiesel@msn.com)

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