Wayne Winterton began his career in 1963 as a public school teacher, and later as the principal of two schools on the Navajo Reservation (Lake Valley, and Dzilth-na-o-dith-hle). He was also the Superintendent of the Albuquerque Indian High School, the Superintendent of Schools for the Northern Pueblos Agency (northern New Mexico), and during 1978-79, he served as the interim President of the Institute of American Indian Arts, a junior college in Santa Fe. In 1986, he joined the staff of the Bureau of Land Management’s National Training Center in Phoenix as the Division Chief for Administrative and Media Services, and later, as Center Director before his retirement in 2004 with 41 years of public service.