Meet Jordan
The story, name, and relationships behind Southern Cloud Consulting.
Aanii Boozhoo
Aanii Boozhoo Inawemaaganak. Gdinmikoon. Anishinaabe-Odawa kwe ndaaw miinwaa Waganakising Odawa ndodabendaagwaz. Nme ndodem miinwaa Anishinaabe aki ndoonjiba. Jaadaan Shananaquet ndo zhaaganaashii noozwin. Nhow.
Hello relatives, I greet you all in a good way. My English name is Jordan Shananaquet. I am an Anishinaabe-Odawa woman and a citizen of the Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians. I belong to the Sturgeon Clan, and I come from Anishinaabe aki.
I have been taught by elders, language teachers, and community knowledge keepers that when we speak about important matters, we begin by introducing ourselves. Not only by name, but by relationship — to people, to place, to Nation, to clan, and to the responsibilities we carry.
That is where this page begins.
The Story Behind Southern Cloud
Southern Cloud is not a name I chose because it sounded good. It is a name I carry.
Shananaquet, my noozwin, carries the meaning Southern Cloud. It is part of how I move through the world: shaped by sky and weather, by movement and memory, by what gathers, what shifts, and what carries across distance.
Southern Cloud Consulting first took shape in 2018 as a place to hold work already growing through education, governance, community planning, history, facilitation, research, writing, and art. In 2026, Southern Cloud continues as an LLC, carrying that work forward with relationship at the center.
Southern Cloud grows from who I am and how I have been shaped: as a Waganakising Odawa citizen, community worker, educator, planner, researcher, writer, and caretaker of stories, systems, and relationships. The work has moved through classrooms, archives, Tribal government, state education systems, community planning tables, and places where people are trying to make decisions that matter.
Again and again, I have seen that good work does not begin with a template. It begins with listening. It begins with trust, memory, place, responsibility, and the willingness to understand what people carry before deciding what should happen next.
Southern Cloud Consulting exists to help people, communities, schools, governments, organizations, and partners build from that place — so the way forward is not only strategic, but accountable to the relationships that must carry it.
How This Work is Carried
Southern Cloud often lives between worlds that are too often treated as separate: education and governance, story and strategy, policy and community, history and future planning, land and learning, systems and relationships.
This is where the strands begin to braid: story with strategy, policy with people, history with future planning, and responsibility with action.
The work we carry together begins with listening, structure, and care. Before anything becomes a facilitated gathering, strategic plan, curriculum, report, policy pathway, community engagement process, written piece, or clear set of next steps, there is time to understand what is already present: the people, questions, tensions, responsibilities, relationships, and hopes connected to the work.
From there, Southern Cloud helps shape what is needed — not by forcing a template, but by building from context, relationship, and purpose.
This work draws on experience in Indigenous education, Tribal governance, facilitation, strategic planning, research, writing, grant-supported programming, community engagement, and land/place-based learning. It is also shaped by Odawa identity, Sturgeon Clan responsibility, and the belief that how we carry the work matters as much as what the work becomes.
Southern Cloud Consulting is for work that needs both clarity and care.
Experience Carried Into the Work
- Indigenous education and learning design
- Tribal governance and policy support
- Facilitation and strategic planning
- Research, writing, and archival work
- Community engagement and program development
- Land/place-based education and relationship-centered planning