At a Catholic mission school in Wild Horse Creek, Mike Charleston learned an important lesson about his culture: Don't practice it.

Charleston, an American Indian, remembers being forbidden to speak his native Choctaw language at school in Oklahoma. Nuns punished offenders by washing their mouths out with soap.

Today, Charleston is committed to training American Indians students to become leaders and help preserve their culture.

Charleston is the director of Penn State's American Indian Policy Center, which runs the American Indian Leadership Program. His tortoise-shell glasses make a startling contrast to his ribbon-embroidered shirt and strand of turquoise stones. Sitting behind a desk cluttered with papers and books, he describes the goals of his program.

"The primary effort is to provide an opportunity for Indian people to come to Penn State and to successfully complete graduate school with the hopes that they will return back to Indian country as quickly as possible," he said.

The program, one of only five in the country, is part of a continuing effort begun in the 60s to open doors for American Indians.

Charleston, an associate professor of education, sees himself as the liaison between the 10 students now in the program and the administration. He tries to ease the students' transition from the reservation to the outside world.

Barbara Froman, who has studied under Charleston, said he is an important advocate for American Indian concerns.

"If anybody needs help they can go to Dr. Charleston," said Froman, a student in Penn State's American Indian Special Education Teacher Training Program.

In 1980, Charleston became the 12th American Indian to obtain a doctoral degree from the leadership program, which is exclusively for American Indians. Since then, he has worked as an evaluation specialist in American Indian education and has completed 12 research projects with various Indian agencies.

He is now working on an dropout prevention program with Dull Knife Memorial College in Montana.

Charleston tries to give University students a picture of who American Indians are by guest-lecturing in history and sociology classes.

"We should create an American society open to multiple groups and cultures. We have defined an 'American' too narrowly," he said.

Charleston has experienced the narrowness of mainstream American thinking.

During pre-integration days, as a non-white, he was automatically labeled "colored" and prohibited from living in the all-white college community at the University of Oklahoma.

"Living in a segregated society before integration wasn't comfortable," he said, shaking his head.

Ignorance has resulted in the "subhuman" treatment of American Indians.

Every year on Thanksgiving, people ask the students in the program to dress up in feathers and put on a dance. Many American Indians are offended by this insensitivity, he said.

University courses in American history or culture should be taught from varied perspectives, giving attention to minority viewpoints, he said.

Students do not realize Thanksgiving and Columbus Day are not celebrated by every American. To many American Indians, these days are hardly cause for celebration.

As a member of the Committee for Racial and Ethnic Diversity, Charleston is pushing to revise University information forms which contain the terminology "Native American" rather than the preferred "Native American Indian."

The term "Native American" causes many people who are not American Indians to list themselves as such [MS]because they may have been born here??[MS] , he said. Because of this, an accurate count of American Indians at Penn State is impossible.

Charleston grew up in the Choctaw nation of southeast Oklahoma. One of more than 300 sovereign American Indian nations recognized by the U.S., the Choctaw nation is a viable, self-governing community. The nation has an elected council and chief, judicial branch and a police force.

The relationship between the Choctaw nation and the U.S. has been established by treaties throughout history. The Choctaws were to receive education and health care in return for their land. But the government has failed to meet the expectations of the Choctaws.

"Indian education is grossly underfunded," Charleston said.

Financial and cultural problems limit the choice of schooling for American Indians. Tribal schools focus on native language and culture but have the lowest budget. Public schools offer the best academic opportunities for the children, but are often "nasty nasty about culture."

After obtaining a bachelors degree in business administration, Charleston became active in Choctaw tribal politics. In addition to proposing a new constitution for the tribe, he participated in the successful Choctaw rally against presidentially-appointed tribal chiefs.

Charleston, one quarter-blood Choctaw and one eighth-blood Cherokee, retains his native culture despite his family's isolation from the Midwest.

The Choctaw religion, music, and food are part of his family life.

He still speaks Choctaw with his wife, Karen -- an Arkansas Cherokee -- and his two sons at home.

But, he adds, "It is difficult to maintain the native language unless there is a community in which to use it."

The fight against an Americanization of his people is a difficult one. And Charleston says he must constantly struggle against the American idea that "Indians don't count."