There were new efforts on Tuesday to preserve the Native American languages that are so important to our tribal neighbors.There were different backgrounds and communities represented but they all shared the same struggle and goal: to preserve their Native languages and their student’s identities."We have less than 2,000 first language Cherokee speakers, that’s out of 460,000 Cherokee citizens," said Ryan Mackey, who was at the Native Language Summit.The U.S. Department of the Interior welcomed tribes from across the country to discuss strategies for preserving their Native languages, including the Cherokee Nation."We’re really proud of the work we have done. Our current administration has invested a lot of time and a lot of effort into our language. It’s a top priority and this program has quadrupled since our new chief came in," Mackey said.They’re erasing the language gap by teaching it to adults and children as young as 6 weeks old, teaching the Cherokee language through programs funded by federal grants within their schools."A lot of various tribes that have similar ceremonies and some of us even look similar, but our language really identifies us as individual groups of people and so if we lose our language, we lose our identity in this," Mackey said.