This article was written and researched by members of the Coalition to Dismantle the Doctrine of Discovery’s Story Sharing working group.
Contributors include: Sara Peachey, Michael Young, Ada Schmidt-Tieszen, Luann Erickson, Mark Jaeger, and Deborah Yoder
“I really, really dislike porridge. And there was an incident where I wouldn’t eat porridge, and, the first time, and I looked down, and there was a bowl in front of me, and I noticed there was worms in it, and I wouldn’t eat it, and the nun come behind me, and she told me, “Eat it,” and I wouldn’t eat it, just nope, and she, she slammed my face in, in the bowl, and picked me up by my arm, and she, she threw me up against the wall, and she started strapping me. And I don’t remember going up the stairs, but I remember her, she had my arm, had me up by one arm. And I don’t remember that, that time gap in between, but after that I remember something broke inside of me that I wasn’t stubborn, but I had to listen or else. And everybody was really terrified of this nun.”
Victoria McIntosh (survivor, Fort Alexander Residential School)1
This article shares about the harm, both personal and collective, that North American Indian Boarding Schools have had, and still have, on Indigenous Peoples. While collecting data and public resources for this article, our team worked diligently to present the stories and information with respect and dignity, using only publicly available information or information shared with us directly. This piece scratches the surface of boarding school history and impacts, and we highly recommend engaging with the resources below for more information. Due to the large number of boarding schools across the United States and Canada, our team decided to mention only three: Carlisle, Haskell, and Fort Alexander (Canada). These will provide a window into the larger narrative around Indian Boarding Schools, the history and legislation surrounding them, and the lasting consequences for Indigenous Peoples to this day.
The History of Indian Boarding Schools/Residential Schools
Imagine going from everything you have ever known, to being stripped of all that makes you you. That is part of the impact that Indigenous children faced when going to Indian Residential Schools. This forced and coerced removal of Native children from their communities during the period of assimilation across Turtle Island (especially between the late 19th century and the late 20th century, but not limited to this timeframe). When outright killing and forced removal did not annihilate Indigenous Peoples, the United States’ and Canadian governments implemented new strategies to genocide entire peoples, for who can claim their Indigeneity if they are in no way connected to their peoples, stories, languages, and land?
It was by this sentiment, “Kill the Indian, save the man,”2 that devastation came for Indigenous Peoples all across Turtle Island for generations into today. The creation of Indian Boarding Schools in North America severed ancient ties of wisdom, tradition, culture, and relationship within hundreds of Native communities through a most insidious evil — the (often forced) removal and “Christianization” of Native children from their tribal communities. The goal of this ongoing genocide of Indigenous Peoples was one driven by greed: those who had access and ownership of the land also had access and ownership of the wealth therein.3 To assimilate Indigenous Peoples or kill them outright meant the extinction of those who inhabited the land before colonial contact, essentially removing any barriers to the land.
The Carlisle Indian Industrial School4, which opened in 1879, marked the beginning of the boarding school movement within the United States. The children of Native people, from all over North America, were forcibly taken to Carlisle as part of the fallout of the 19th-century Indian Wars. Although Carlisle operated as an Indian Boarding School for only 40 years5, it became the baseline and model for other boarding schools across the United States.
Though the start of the boarding school era began in the late 1800s, there are still several that continue to operate today (approximately 125 schools in the United States alone6).
Haskell Indian Nations University in Lawrence, Kansas had its origins in 1884 as the United States Indian Industrial Training School. Like other boarding schools, its purpose was to forcibly assimilate tribal children into the dominant culture. Educational instruction was provided initially for grades one through five with an emphasis on agricultural learning. Crops raised were sold to provide income for the school.
In 1887, the school’s name was changed to Haskell Institute after Dudley Haskell, chairman of the Committee on Indian Affairs. Although the school was designed around vocational training, underfunding eventually made educational goals secondary, with students spending most of their time in labor to keep the institution solvent. Around 1894 the educational program was expanded to provide a high school curriculum with Haskell beginning to offer post-secondary courses in 1927.
A turning point for Haskell and for Indian Education overall occurred when Dr. Henry Roe Cloud was appointed as the first Native American Superintendent; the militaristic style of education was abandoned and Indigenous voices were prominent. Haskell was evolving into a post-secondary vocational-technical school; high school was phased out by 1965. In 1970, the school was accredited as Haskell Indian Junior College. In the 1990’s, it was renamed Haskell Indian Nations University and adopted its vision of becoming a national center for Indian education, research, and cultural preservation.
The school provides partial fulfillment of treaty obligations and trust responsibility between the United States and tribal nations. Haskell is currently a public, land-grant, federally supported institution within the Bureau of Indian Education, although recent changes in federal funding and discussions concerning Indigenous control may alter some aspects of the school (Haskell Indian Nations University website, “History”; Haskell Cultural Center and Museum).
Fort Alexander Residential School opened in 1905 and was operated by the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate in partnership with two other mission organizations until it closed in 1970. These were the Sisters of the Cross who were involved from 1905 until 1914 and the Missionary Oblate Sisters of the Sacred Heart and of Mary Immaculate who were involved from 1914 until the school closed7.
Although the Fort Alexander Residential School closed over 50 years ago, the harms inflicted there are still impacting in 2025. Survivor Mary Starr described the impacts she sees, both in the community where the school once stood, the Sagkeeng First Nation, as well as in the city of Winnipeg which lies 78 miles to the southwest.
“So they go up very disturbed. They know it’s not right. Deep down, they know. They know it’s wrong. But the people here that had their authority over them are the ones that are forcing them to do these things. And they’re forcing them by saying that they represent God, they represent Creator. I saw some things in there that, you know, disturbed me also. I went through a lot of healing. And my family was there. Six of us. Five above me that were all in there, and we all went through our, you know, different ways of having to heal.
But some families have not been so fortunate. Yeah. You know? It’s there and it’s carried on and manifested in different ways, the effects of you know. And now you see these younger generation are killing themselves now. It’s self-inflicted because rather than lash out at what’s hurting them, which could be their own parents or own siblings, they’re hurting themselves. They’re hurting themselves. They’re killing themselves slowly. It’s a slow suicide with those drugs.” 8
Lasting Legacies
From the 1960s to the 1980s the BIA (Bureau of Indian Affairs) began to close boarding schools or turn their operation over to the Bureau of Indian Education (BIE) and Tribal Nations.9 This shift was aided by key legislation like the 1972 Indian Education Act which provided additional federal funding for schools, and empowered Native American and Alaskan Native parents to join advisory boards for federal boarding and public schools.10 In 1975, Tribal governments were granted greater autonomy over local programs by the Indian Self Determination and Education Assistance Act.
While many of these schools have closed down or changed administrative hands, the effects of the boarding school era and its goals of assimilation are still felt today. The removal of children from their families was a traumatic experience that broke community and cultural ties. Trauma was compounded by the abusive and harsh conditions that children faced while attending boarding schools. As a result of these conditions, many children died and were buried on or near school grounds. In their Federal Indian Boarding School Initiative Investigative Report, the [U.S.] Department of the Interior identified approximately 53 marked or unmarked burial sites, but expect to find more as the investigation continues.11 This number only includes research into federal boarding schools, and excludes the many boarding schools that were run by Christian denominations who kept their own records.
Up in Canada, in 2021, ground-penetrating radar located potential human remains outside a residential school near Kamloops.12 While this discovery shocked the conscience of the nation, survivors were not surprised13 as Indigenous Peoples have been telling Canadians for years what had been done in their name. In fact, 6 years earlier, when the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s Final Report was published, an entire volume was dedicated to Missing Children and Unmarked Burials.14
Even for those who survived, these traumas are not just psychological — they manifest in the physical bodies of survivors and impact their health. Studies have found that boarding school attendees who are now adults “were more likely to have cancer (more than three times), tuberculosis (more than twice), high cholesterol (95 percent), diabetes (81 percent), anemia (61 percent), arthritis (60 percent), and gall bladder disease (60 percent) than nonattendees”15. In some families, multiple generations attended boarding schools, leading to intergenerational trauma and disrupted cultural and familial ties.
While some research has been conducted on the history of Indian Boarding Schools in the United States, the Department of the Interior’s investigative report acknowledges that there is still work to be done to fully understand the scope and impact of this system.
In Canada, despite the work of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, residential school denialism continues to persist in an attempt to downplay the harms of the residential school system.16 There is still a need for continued truth-telling accompanied by action.
Action and Resources
In 2025 the United States federal government once again broke promises to tribal peoples when DOGE cut an estimated 25% of the staff on the campus of Haskell University. Funding for Haskell University in Kansas stems from legal obligations that the US government agreed to when it signed treaties with Native American tribes. Although 14 staff had been reinstated as of March 12, 2025, classes were disrupted in the middle of the semester and basic food and cleaning services were in disarray because support staff were cut.17
Senator Moran of Kansas has charged that the Bureau of Indian Education (BIE) has long neglected the infrastructure of the campus, and violated the responsibilities to provide education under the 1972 Indian Education Act as well as treaty agreements. In June of 2025 a bill was introduced in Congress (H.R. 4085) to establish Haskell as ‘a federally chartered educational institution’ to fulfill the treaty responsibility of the federal government towards Native American education.
Federal governments were not the only partner in the project of Native American child removal. Many of these schools were funded, in part, and/or run by various Christian denominations across North America. As a Coalition of majority Christian and Christian descended people, we organize together to support legislative action, truth telling, and accountability within our own denominations and in the federal government. Interested in joining a cross-denominational working group focused on Boarding School policy and truth telling? Join us! Contact Doe Hoyer (doe@dismantlediscovery.org) for more information.
Resources for more learning
USA:
- Connect with the National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition to support their ongoing work in the U.S.
- Support The Native American Rights Fund — a legal advocacy group — works toward Boarding School Healing and takes up cases like the Winnebago Repatriation Request to Carlisle Boarding School (Winnebago v. Department of Army)
CANADA:
- Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada – https://nctr.ca/about/history-of-the-trc/truth-and-reconciliation-commission-of-canada/
- Circles for Reconciliation — https://circlesforreconciliation.ca
- ‘Denying our truth’: the fight against residential school denialism in Canada – https://www.aljazeera.com/news/longform/2025/2/7/denying-our-truth-fighting-residential-school-denialism-in-canada
Footnotes
1 The Survivors Speak: A Report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada, pg. 75 – https://publications.gc.ca/collections/collection_2015/trc/IR4-5-2015-eng.pdf
2 Written by Captain Richard H. Pratt in 1875
3 From “the beginning, Federal policy toward the Indian was based on the desire to dispossess him of his land. Education policy was a function of our land policy.”44 42 Department of the Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Albuquerque Indian School, 1947-ca. 1964
5 https://www.nps.gov/cibs/index.htm
6 https://boardingschoolhealing.org/list/
7 https://shsb.mb.ca/fort-alexandre-ecole-residentielle/?lang=en
8 M. Starr, personal communication, March 15, 2025
9 National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition. (2020). Healing Voices Volume 1: A Primer on American Indian and Alaska Native Boarding Schools in the U.S. https://secureservercdn.net/198.71.233.187/ee8.a33.myftpupload.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/NABS-Newsletter-2020-7-1-spreads.pdf
10 https://www.nlm.nih.gov/nativevoices/timeline/530.html
11 Newland, Bryan (May 2022). Federal Indian Boarding School Initiative Investigative Report (PDF). Washington, D.C.: Office of the Assistant Secretary – Indian Affairs, U.S. Department of the Interior. Archived (PDF) from the original on May 11, 2022
12 CBS News, “Canada’s unmarked graves: How residential schools carried out “cultural genocide” against indigenous children” (2023) Link: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/canada-residential-schools-unmarked-graves-indigenous-children-60-minutes-2023-02-12/
13 The Globe and Mail, “Survivors not surprised by unmarked graves at former residential school in B.C.” (2021). Link: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/article-survivors-not-surprised-by-unmarked-graves-at-former-residential/
14 Volume 4: Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada, “Missing Children and Unmarked Burials” Link: https://ehprnh2mwo3.exactdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/Volume_4_Missing_Children_English_Web.pdf
15 Newland, Bryan (May 2022). Federal Indian Boarding School Initiative Investigative Report (PDF) page 88. Washington, D.C.: Office of the Assistant Secretary – Indian Affairs, U.S. Department of the Interior.
16 CBC Canada, “Residential school denialism: what is it and how to recognize it” (2025) Link: https://www.cbc.ca/news/indigenous/residential-school-denialism-explainer-1.748595
17 DOGE-mandated cuts targeted staff at a Native American college. A Lawsuit fights back, NPR, B. Sullivan, March 10, 2025) – https://www.npr.org/2025/03/10/nx-s1-5321991/haskell-indian-nations-university-basketball-coach-doge-lawsuit
