Dr. Denis Viri served as Research Associate with CIE from 1998 to 2010 and as Interim Director of the Center from 2001-2005. Upon accepting employment with the CIE, Dr. Viri brought 25 years of experience working with Arizona tribes including the Hopi Tribe Education Department, Hotevilla-Bacavi Community School, The Hopi Center for Human Services, the Pascua Yaqui Tribe of Arizona as well as internships with the Tohono O'odham Nation Education Department. During his tenure as Interim Director, Dr. Viri secured and administered grant funded projects that supported the preparation of Native teachers in Arizona schools; a 5-year research project examining the effects of culture-based Native teacher preparation on teacher perceptions and performance; a three-year project to reinforce planning and advocacy for innovations in Native higher education guided by a formal network of Arizona's three public universities and tribal entities; and a project to document the history of the WWII age Japanese relocation interment at Poston on the Colorado River Indian Reservation. His work and research interests had also taken him to Indigenous communities in Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Mexico, Kazakhstan, Khakasia, Peru, Bolivia, Guatemala, Ecuador, and Argentina. He also served previously as an English language teacher in the Peace Corps in the Somali Republic (1969-1970) and a teacher training/health and nutrition project in Tamil Nadu, India (1971). Dr. Viri received his Ph.D, in 1989 from the University of Arizona, completing a dissertation entitled, "Subjective Realities of American Indian Students in an Urban Community College Setting: A Tohono O'odham Case Study.