Michelle Sarche

Associate Professor, University of Colorado - Denver
Aurora, Colorado

Dr. Michelle Sarche is a licensed clinical psychologist and has worked with both urban and reservation American Indian and Alaska Native communities for over 25 years. Her work has focused on children’s development, parenting, and early care environments such as Head Start, home visiting, and child care. Her current projects include the Tribal Early Childhood Research Center, the Native Children’s Research Exchange, the Buffering Toxic Stress Consortium, the American Indian and Alaska Native Head Start Family and Child Experiences Survey Workgroup, the Multi-site Implementation Evaluation of Tribal Home Visiting, the Maternal and Child Health Link program, and two recently funded alcohol-exposed pregnancy prevention projects. Sarche is a member of the Lac Courte Oreilles Band of Ojibwe, where her grandmother was born and raised.

My Truth

Disparities in health and well-being in American Indian and Alaska Native communities are driven by serious structural barriers, as well as by the intergenerational effects of historically traumatic events on tribal communities and individuals. At the same time, American Indian and Alaska Native communities are rich in spirit and resolved to create environments in which their citizens thrive. My bold vision is to harness the power of community-engaged research to gather and disseminate data to tell a rich story of the challenges and triumphs faced by American Indian and Alaska Native children, families, and communities, and the early care and education systems that support them.

Stories featuring Michelle Sarche

We are pleased to share Ascend at the Aspen Institute’s newest report – Reimagining Child Welfare and Realizing a Networked Approach to Family Well-Being. Tapping the expertise and experience of families, Ascend Fellows, and the Ascend Network, this report is the result of our effort that began in 2020 to interrogate the systems, practices, and policies that …

New Report: Reimagining Child Welfare Read More »

PublicationApril 10, 2023
This year, the Aspen Idea Festival returns to in-person programming at our campus in the Rocky Mountains June 25 - July 1, 2022.
Ascend FellowshipJune 15, 2022
A commitment to rigorous learning and evaluation is fundamental to the implementation of a two-generation (2Gen) approach so that we’re measuring how well programs and policies serve the whole family. This is reflected in research being the first principle of a 2Gen approach, and it’s embedded in the day-to-day work of Ascend’s 450+ nationwide Network Partners. These visionary practitioners and systems …

From Proof Points to Building Evidence: Creating A Two-Generation (2Gen) Research Agenda Read More »

Ascend NetworkMarch 10, 2022
The COVID-19 pandemic has made more evident than ever the need to transform policies, practice, and systems to build upon the inherent resilience of families – especially those with low incomes and from BIPOC communities. In 2018 – 677,529 children experienced maltreatment in the US. 51 percent of those children were Black, Indigenous, or children …

Investing in Futures Means Investing in Families: Announcing the Two-Generation Prenatal to Three Learning and Action Community Read More »

BlogDecember 9, 2020
Ascend is honored that our Executive Director Anne Mosle has been named to the Holding Co.’s CARE 100 List, a first-of-its-kind list of the people doing the most to re-imagine and re-humanize our care system. We are even more overjoyed to see so many of our Ascend Fellows, Network partners, Parent Advisors, philanthropic partners, and …

Here’s to Warriors and Weavers for Care Read More »

BlogOctober 23, 2020
Several cities, states, and municipalities across the US now use the second Monday in October to honor and celebrate Native American history, cultures, and communities. As America grapples with structural racism and the coronavirus pandemic, Indigenous Peoples’ Day offers us an opportunity to reflect on how Native traditions and teachings can offer guidance on how …

Indigenous Peoples’ Day Is an Opportunity to Reexamine History and Reimagine Our Future Read More »

BlogOctober 12, 2020
Black Lives Matter. As a collective of leaders committed to advancing two-generation strategies to end multigenerational poverty, we believe that the only path to that outcome is through a reckoning with our past and present, and a fundamental shift in our institutions. This requires a new social contract to remedy the harms of White supremacy –a …

Undo A System of White Supremacy: The Call for a New Social Contract Read More »

BlogJune 29, 2020
Kwame AnkuChairman and CEOBlack Star Fund Sacramento, CAMy Vision – The problem I am focusing on solving is breaking the economic disparity cycle afflicting people of the African diaspora. I call my bold vision 100X100. It is a vision of 100 Black investment managers who will each manage $100M innovation funds by 2025. I believe we …

2018 Ascend Fellow Action Plans Read More »

Ascend FellowshipJune 19, 2019
2018 Ascend Fellows
NEWS RELEASE Contact: Lindsay Broyhill Ascend at the Aspen Institute Tel: 202.721.5596 Lindsay.broyhill@aspeninstitute.org Prestigious Aspen Institute Ascend Fellowship Announces 2018 Class of Leaders Diverse Leaders Selected for Their Groundbreaking Work Advancing Opportunity for Children and Families With Low Incomes Washington, DC, September 6, 2018 – The Aspen Institute announced today the 2018 class of Aspen …

Prestigious Aspen Institute Ascend Fellowship Announces 2018 Class of Leaders Read More »

Press ReleasesSeptember 6, 2018

Convenings Featuring Michelle Sarche

Location: Aspen, CO
Ascend Fellow Dr. Nathan Chomilo, Medical Director at Minnesota’s Medicaid and MinnesotaCares programs, asks: Is the blueprint we are following to reconstruct our healthcare system just? Chomilo suggests we need to stop wallpaper over cracks in our...
ConveningJuly 30, 2023
Location: Virtual
Please join us for a national briefing on a new, groundbreaking two-generation analysis of families with low incomes across the US. This new comparative analysis of 2011 and 2021 Census data, looking at children and the adults in their lives...
ConveningMarch 2, 2023