Tiffany S. Lee is Dibé Łizhiní (Blacksheep) Diné from Crystal, New Mexico and Oglala Lakota from Pine Ridge, South Dakota. Dr. Lee is a Professor and the Chair of Native American Studies.  Her research examines issues in Indigenous education and specifically Indigenous language education, maintenance, and revitalization.  She has received numerous grants, such as a $1million grant from the Spencer foundation to examine  educational and culturally-based outcomes of Indigenous language immersion schools.  She is currently engaged in investigating the relationship of Diné language learning to wellbeing, and Native youth perspectives on language reclamation, and socio-culturally centered education. Her research is Indigenous- and relationship-centered through the involvement of colleagues, students, and community partners.

Her research has been published extensively in journals, such as the American Journal of Education, Harvard Educational Review, the Journals of Language, Identity, and Education, American Indian Education, and Comparative Education Review; and in books, such as Culturally Sustaining Pedagogies: Teaching and Learning for Justice in a Changing World, The Yazzie Case: Building a Public Education System for our Indigenous Future, Indigenous language revitalization in the Americas, and Social Justice Pedagogy across the Curriculum: The Practice of Freedom. 

Beyond scholarly research and publications, she is a former high school social studies and language arts teacher at schools on the Navajo Nation and at Santa Fe Indian School.  She collaborates with colleagues on Saad K’idilyé, a Diné language nest in Albuquerque and in a teacher preparation program to prepare Diné language immersion educators through the Diné Language Teacher Institute.  She is also the former President of the American Indian Studies Association and Diné Studies Conference, Inc.