Native American boarding schools

Native American boarding schools
Unknown authorUnknown author · Public domain · source
Name	Native American boarding schools
Caption	Students at Carlisle Indian Industrial School in the 1880s
Established	19th century
Closed	20th century (varied)
Type	Residential school system
Location	United States, Alaska, Hawaii

Native American boarding schools were institutions established primarily in the 19th and 20th centuries in the United States to educate and assimilate Indigenous children from tribes across North America. Operated by agencies such as the Bureau of Indian Affairs, religious organizations including the Catholic Church, Methodist Episcopal Church, Presbyterian Church (USA), and the Quakers (Religious Society of Friends), and by mission societies like the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, these schools like the Carlisle Indian Industrial School, Haskell Indian Nations University, and Chemawa Indian School sought to transform Indigenous identities through removal from families, curricular practices, and institutional discipline. Debates over their intentions and legacies involve figures and entities such as Richard Henry Pratt, Ely Samuel Parker, John Collier, Helen Hunt Jackson, and policies tied to acts such as the Indian Appropriations Act and the Dawes Act.

Background and origins

European colonization, frontier expansion, and settler policies including treaties like the Treaty of Fort Laramie (1868) and the Medicine Lodge Treaty set the context for state-directed assimilation initiatives. Early missionary schools were established by organizations such as the Moravian Church, Roman Catholic Church in the United States, and the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions in places like Santa Fe, San Francisco, and St. Augustine, Florida. The model shifted after the founding of the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in 1879 by Richard Henry Pratt, whose motto "Kill the Indian, save the man" influenced later projects including the Forest Grove Indian School, Fort Simcoe School, and schools run by the Bureau of Indian Affairs. Federal policies under administrations of presidents such as Ulysses S. Grant, Chester A. Arthur, and Benjamin Harrison expanded funding and oversight, while reformers like Ely S. Parker and John Collier later criticized or reorganized aspects of the system.

Policies and administration

Administration involved federal agencies and denominational boards: the Bureau of Indian Affairs, the Office of Indian Affairs, tribal governments including the Navajo Nation, Oglala Sioux Tribe, and mission societies like the Board of National Missions (Presbyterian Church)]. Enrollment policies referenced statutes and legal frameworks such as the Indian Appropriations Act (1871), the Indian Citizenship Act of 1924, and local orders tied to reservations like the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation. Superintendents, military officers, and clerical administrators—including figures associated with Fort Marion transfers and the Boarding School Movement—enforced rules on attendance, custodial authority, and disciplinary practices, often coordinating with boarding schools such as Flandreau Indian School, Mount Pleasant Indian Industrial Boarding School, and Riverside Indian School.

Daily life and education

Daily regimens in institutions such as Haskell Institute (later Haskell Indian Nations University), Chemawa Indian School, and the Phoenix Indian School mixed academic instruction with vocational training in settings influenced by industrial education advocates like Samuel P. Huntington (not the political scientist) and agrarian programs. Curricula borrowed from secondary institutions like the United States Naval Academy and emphasized trades taught at places such as the Chilocco Indian Agricultural School and Tuba City Boarding School. Students experienced schedules of classroom time, manual labor, religious services led by Catholic nuns, Methodist missionaries, and musical instruction referencing military bands such as those formed at Carlisle. The schools used materials aligned with standards from institutions like the Smithsonian Institution for ethnographic study and sometimes collaborated with progressive educators related to the Progressive Era.

Cultural suppression and assimilation practices

Policies implemented cultural assimilation through language bans, hair cutting, clothing regulations, and forbidding ceremonies such as Sun Dance and Potlatch (ceremony) practices. Administrators enforced English-only policies, suppressed use of Indigenous languages like Lakota, Navajo (Diné) language, Ojibwe language, Cherokee language, and Hopi language, and punished cultural expression associated with clans and kinship systems like those of the Cherokee Nation, Choctaw Nation, Seminole Tribe of Florida, and Acoma Pueblo. Churches and missions—St. Michael's Mission (Alaska), Catholic Indian Mission networks, and Methodist Missionization projects—entered partnerships with federal officials to shape rituals and identity. The curriculum and disciplinary systems echoed broader assimilation laws such as provisions in the Allotment policy under the Dawes Act (1887).

Health, abuse, and mortality

Poor sanitation, overcrowding, and inadequate medical care in many schools—documented in institutions like Carlisle, Bureau of Indian Affairs hospitals, and reservation hospitals—contributed to outbreaks of influenza, tuberculosis, and other diseases during periods including the 1918 influenza pandemic. Investigations and testimonies by reformers like Sherwood Eddy and officials in reports to Congress documented neglect, corporal punishment, forced labor, and instances of sexual abuse involving staff associated with religious orders and federal personnel. Mortality records and recent research using records from National Archives and Records Administration, tribal records from nations such as Lakota Sioux, Anishinaabe, and Tlingit have revealed burial grounds at sites like Haskell and Pine Ridge.

Resistance, survival, and community impacts

Students, families, and tribal leaders resisted through runaways, petitions, legal challenges, cultural persistence, and creating clandestine networks to preserve languages and ceremonies. Leaders and activists connected to resistance include figures from the American Indian Movement, such as Russell Means and Dennis Banks, advocates like Vine Deloria Jr., and grassroots organizers in tribal nations including the Navajo Nation Council, Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation, and Blackfeet Nation. Community survival strategies involved oral histories preserved by individuals like Ella Deloria and educational renewal movements that fed into institutions such as Native American Studies programs at universities like the University of New Mexico, University of Arizona, and University of North Dakota.

Legacy, reparations, and contemporary efforts

Contemporary responses include truth-telling initiatives, official apologies from entities like the United States Senate, statements from denominations including the Presbyterian Church (USA) and the Roman Catholic Church, and legislative actions at federal and state levels such as bills introduced in the United States Congress and commissions influenced by the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Efforts for reparations, land acknowledgments, and educational reform have involved programs at tribal colleges such as Sinte Gleska University and Haskell Indian Nations University, memorialization at sites like the Carlisle Barracks and community-driven projects by tribal historic preservation offices in nations including the Cherokee Nation and Tulalip Tribes of Washington. Academic and grassroots scholarship from researchers at institutions such as the Smithsonian Institution National Museum of the American Indian, Dartmouth College, Harvard University, and tribal archives continues documenting impacts and supporting language revitalization initiatives for languages like Hopi, Lakota, Diné Bizaad, Keres, and Michif.

Category:Boarding schools in the United States