Ain Dah Yung Center

The Ain Dah Yung Center -- which means "our home" in the Ojibwe language -- began in 1983 as an emergency shelter for runaway and homeless American Indian youth.

The shelter quickly filled the need for a culturally relevant and safe place in the Twin Cities – one of the most concentrated urban American Indian populations in the United States.

While the shelter remains the backbone for the Ain Dah Yung Center’s mission to strengthen American Indian youth and families, it has grown to address a wide variety of issues in the American Indian community.

Today, the Ain Dah Yung Center is a national model for providing a broad spectrum of culturally relevant and cost-effective social services to American Indian youth and their families – a group that has been reluctant to use mainstream government services and programs.

The Ain Dah Yung Center provides a continuum of care and services – recognizing that, in American Indian culture, you can’t grow as a person until you have honor, dignity, and respect for both yourself and everything around you.

Each year, the Ain Dah Yung Center provides services to about 500 youth and families, using traditional American Indian beliefs as a starting point for personal and community growth.