Gail Schubert and bering straits native corporation: providing for shareholders and their descendants.

• Author: Anjum, Shehla
• Position: SPECIAL SECTION: 2016 Top 49ers

No one lives anymore in the small two-bedroom house in Unalakleet where Gail Anagick Schubert and her eight siblings grew up. During part of her childhood the house had no electricity, running water, or central heating. "We all studied at the kitchen table, the warmest place in the house, because it was close to the wood-fired oven," Schubert says.

From that simple life in Unalakleet, Schubert, an Inupiaq, went on to earn degrees from Stanford and Cornell, two of the nation's most prestigious universities. She worked in New York City at Wall Street law firms and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York before returning to Alaska in 1992. Soon after she returned she decided to run for the board of directors of Bering Straits Native Corporation (BSNC), her regional corporation. Today she is the president and CEO of the corporation.

Desire to Excel

Schubert says her desire to excel is a result of the encouragement she received from her parents--Betty and Lowell Anagick--and the teachers at the Bureau of Indian Affairs school in Unalakleet, which she attended through grade nine. "My parents could only attend school through the eighth grade, which is where education in the village stopped at that time, but they cared for our education. They wanted to ensure that we studied hard and were successful," she says.

After completing ninth grade, Schubert moved to Anchorage for high school. Two sisters were already attending Stanford, so it was natural that Schubert would follow them there. That education was a priority in her family is evident in her parents attaining their GED certificates later in life and her mother going on to get an associate's degree from the University of Alaska Fairbanks.

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Her childhood dream was to become a nurse, Schubert says. "One of my older sisters had gone to nursing school and worked in Pennsylvania. I loved seeing photos of her nurse's uniform."

In time, that romantic image of a nurse in a starched uniform and prim hat faded; Schubert got a degree in political science at Stanford and went on to Cornell to study business administration. But she didn't stop after her MBA. Schubert remembers how, when she was five or six, her great-grandmother Miyugak, the oldest daughter of the last traditional chief of Unalakleet, told her, "You are going to be a lawyer someday."

It is probable her great-grandmother's words and her older sister Ella's decision to study law both played a role in Schubert entering Cornell's law school after receiving her MBA. After law school Schubert worked in New York City for eight years, but Alaska beckoned. "I missed my family. So I moved back and got a job with a law firm in Anchorage."

BSNC Beckons

Not long after she came back in 1992, Schubert realized that BSNC was experiencing financial difficulties. "When I realized that BSNC was facing some critical issues and I felt my work experience and business education would be helpful, I ran for a seat on the board and was elected."

In 2003, Schubert went to work for BSNC as an executive vice president and general counsel. She became CEO in 2009 and in 2010 was also named as the corporation's president, when Tim Towarak resigned to become chair of the Federal Subsistence Board.

BSNC was one of the smaller Alaska Native regional corporations when Schubert joined its board in 1992. "We were based in Nome and we didn't have a substantial Anchorage office. We focused on opportunities in Nome, mainly...