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In late October, President Joe 麻豆视传媒免费观看 for the U.S. Indian Boarding Schools program, a century-long concerted effort by the federal government to destroy Native American culture and assimilate Native children through a network of residential schools. This apology鈥攖he first of its kind by a sitting U.S. president鈥攃omes in the wake of the Department of the Interior publishing the second and final volume of its investigative report, which quantified the scope of the economic, social, and human impacts of one of the most destructive assimilation policies in American history.听听

Beyond laying bare the devasting impact of the boarding school program on Native communities and children, the Interior Department report also issued an explicit call for the federal government to pursue policies that help Indigenous communities heal, while raising awareness about the lasting impacts of the boarding schools on Native welfare. However, the report made it clear that well-intentioned policymaking and awareness initiatives will be insufficient in addressing the harms done to Native people. The federal government must also commit itself to investment in Indian Country commensurate with the scale of the trauma, economic harms, and social harms the boarding schools levied onto Native people and communities.听听

With President-elect Donald Trump set to retake office in January, it is imperative that the steps President 麻豆视传媒免费观看 and the Interior Department have taken do not wither on the vine. Given the of Trump鈥檚 last term for Indian Country鈥攁s well as the anti-diversity, he and his proxies expressed on the 2016, 2020, and 2024 campaign trails鈥攊t will be essential for congressional, state, philanthropic, and private sector actors to take steps to secure future investment and policy change to promote Native American welfare, prosperity, and self-actualization.听

This analysis provides a brief overview of the federal Indian boarding school system as well as current federal investments targeting Native American education, and proposes several complementary policy actions for holistically supporting Native individuals and communities. It also outlines some of the ongoing barriers to public awareness about the long-term impacts of federal abuse toward Indian Country, and how the historic and modern lack of public awareness creates barriers to new investment in tribal education and cultural revitalization.听

What were the federal Indian boarding schools?听

The boarding schools have their roots in the the U.S. government has to Native American tribes. In exchange for the land cessations that Native nations made to the U.S., the federal government obligated itself to meet certain needs for tribes and Native American people for as long as the United States continued to exist on the land. Among these obligations is meeting the educational needs of Native American children.听听

However, while the deceptively benign name of 鈥渂oarding school鈥� may conjure images of bucolic campuses and ivy-covered buildings for most Americans, these institutions were instead designed as tools of assimilation and cultural genocide toward Native nations. This mission was with the passage of the assimilation-focused , which empowered the executive branch to 鈥渋n every case where he shall judge improvement in the habits and condition of such Indians practicable鈥�employ capable persons of good moral character鈥� and introduce to any tribe adjoining a frontier settlement the 鈥渁rts of civilization.鈥� The boarding schools were a key tool for advancing the assimilation mission. In many cases, Native American children were kidnapped from their homes and in federal 鈥渟chools,鈥� where they were forced to take new 鈥渨hite鈥� names, forbidden from speaking Native languages, and prohibited from taking part in any Native cultural practices.听

The findings of are sobering. The report identifies 417 boarding schools across 37 states, as well as an additional 1,025 institutions such as day schools, orphanages, and boarding schools that did not receive government funding, but advanced similarly destructive assimilation efforts. Most disturbingly, the report confirms that at least 973 Native children died while in the custody of these schools, which separated children as from their parents and communities and subjected them to rampant , , and . None of this should be surprising from a set of institutions whose architect, Richard Henry Pratt, stated his goal was to 听

Nor was the U.S. government unaware of the abuses happening at these schools. As early as 1928, the , published by a team led by Brookings researcher Lewis Meriam, documented the substandard education and living conditions at the boarding schools. However, crucially, the Meriam Report did not call for the closure of the boarding schools, but rather recommended additional funding for them, with the aim of helping them function more effectively. In 1969, the Committee on Labor and Public Welfare published a new analysis, known as the , condemning the boarding schools and labeling them a 鈥渘ational tragedy.鈥澨�听

Yet despite decades of efforts by both Native and non-Native people to call out the abuses at these schools, they nonetheless continued to operate as tools of assimilation until well into the second half of the 20th century. All told, the U.S. government spent more than on the boarding school system between 1871 and 1969, according to the Interior Department report. note the last assimilationist boarding school didn鈥檛 close until 1978鈥攖he year the Indian Child Welfare Act was passed. Today, there are boarding schools that continue to operate on some tribal reservations; however, they are frequently run by or in partnership with tribes, and don鈥檛 share the same explicitly assimilationist mission of those operating in earlier decades.听

At their peak in 1926, an estimated were enrolled in boarding schools. Today, most Native American people are descendants of boarding school survivors, and many of those survivors are still alive. Indeed, many Native American people who are today in their 60s or older, particularly those who grew up in reservation communities, attended boarding schools.听

What is the state of Native American education today?听

While the boarding school era ended in the late 20th century, Native American students continue to face inequalities in educational access and outcomes. The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights鈥� 2003 report, , found that federal spending throughout the late 1990s and early 2000s had been wholly insufficient in meeting the basic needs of tribal communities. Moreover, the report found that because increases in funding for Native-serving programs failed to keep up with inflation, the constant-dollar value for federal investment in Indian Country had actually fallen over time.听

Despite the report鈥檚 findings鈥攁nd its explicit call for strengthened investments鈥攖he Commission鈥檚 follow-up report in 2018, , found that 鈥渆fforts undertaken by the federal government in the past fifteen years [had] resulted in only minor improvements, at best, for the Native population as a whole, and, in some respects, the U.S. Government [had] backslid in its treatment of Native Americans鈥�.听听

While the federal government cannot simply spend its way out of liability for the boarding schools, sustained and scaled investment in tribal communities is necessary for reducing the level of social, physical, and economic harms that the legacy of the schools and other past assimilationist policies such as the continue to inflict. As of 2024, was approximately $35 billion, including $25 billion in discretionary appropriations (approximately 2% to 3% of the federal government鈥檚 for FY 2024). While this topline spending number may seem significant, only $2.5 billion of these appropriations is directly funding Native early childhood, K-12, and postsecondary education programs鈥攁 level of investment that is clearly insufficient given the ongoing challenges that Native students and communities face, and the scale of the federal government鈥檚 total investment in Native boarding schools throughout the 19th and 20th centuries.¹

While insufficient, the federal government鈥檚 current investments into Native American education鈥攁s well as tribal community and economic development more broadly鈥攏onetheless provide potential channels for addressing the legacy of the boarding schools. Investing in tribally centered, tribally led systems of education for Native children and college students is one clear example. Indeed, the current landscape of tribally run K-12 schools and institutions of higher education was partially motivated by the Kennedy Report, which鈥攊n addition to calling for the end of the boarding schools鈥攃alled for the federal government to establish an 鈥渆xemplary school system鈥� with funding for education, language and cultural revitalization, and trauma counseling.听听

In the wake of the Kennedy Report, Congress enacted the Indian Self-Determination and Education Assistance Act of 1975 (ISDEAA), which repudiated the boarding schools by allowing tribes to contract with the federal government to run their own schools and determine their own curricula.听听

Today, the vast majority of Native American students attend state or locally run public schools. However, of American Indian and Alaska Native youth鈥攑rimarily in rural reservation communities that aren鈥檛 served by public schools鈥攁re now enrolled across funded by the Interior Department鈥檚 Bureau of Indian Education (BIE). The BIE鈥檚 portfolio includes 129 tribally controlled K-12 schools and 56 BIE-operated K-12 schools, plus two BIE-operated higher education institutions (Haskell Indian Nations University and Southwestern Indian Polytechnic Institute). In addition, some tribes run their own schools that are independent of the BIE portfolio, but still receive federal funding through agencies such as the Department of Health and Human Services鈥� . In addition to the two BIE-operated higher education institutions, there are an additional 33 tribally chartered or majority-Native tribal colleges and universities (TCUs) that are members of the American Indian Higher Education Consortium. These institutions administer .听听

These schools not only serve to educate Native children and young adults鈥攖hey also in revitalizing tribal language and cultural identity, and are critical in helping Native students break out of generational poverty and for Native individuals and communities. They often with Head Start providers in Indian Country to improve the quality and availability of early childhood education for Native children. Likewise, tribal higher education institutions contribute to tribal community and economic development. Like other higher education institutions, faculty at TCUs and other Native-serving organizations 鈥攐ften leveraging Indigenous methodologies鈥攖hat contributes to community well-being. In addition, report working in areas related to Native American communities or tribal lands, making TCUs an important source of workforce development for tribal communities.听

However, these institutions and the students they serve still face acute challenges. Despite , schools in the BIE鈥檚 K-12 system have persistently languished due to poor management, insufficient funding, and eroding physical infrastructure. Additional disinvestment by the federal government in domains outside of education鈥攕uch as health care and housing鈥攈as created severe obstacles for Native students that BIE schools are ill-equipped to address. As a result, students at BIE schools perform more than the national average, and about one-third of a grade level behind nearby non-BIE public schools. Only in the BIE鈥檚 K-12 system ultimately graduate from high school.听听

In higher education, while TCUs have generated for the well-being of individual alumni and communities, they have also been plagued by chronic underfunding. For example, of the nearly $345 million in research funding into land grant institutions, less than $5 million was appropriated specifically for research at TCUs (which Congress designated as ). Despite the fact that the land grant system was originally created in 1862 through the , in 2022, TCUs received just 1% of the level of land grant capacity funding on a per-institution basis as land grant institutions that were designated under Congress鈥� original 1862 law. While TCUs receive an average of in land grant capacity funding, non-tribal 1862 land grant institutions received an average of $11.6 million per institution. Additionally, many funding streams that specifically target Native American students are ultimately awarded to non-tribal institutions. For example, in FY 2021, the Congressional Research Service 85% of all funding appropriated through the Department of Agriculture鈥檚 $5 million New Beginning for Tribal Students program was ultimately awarded to 1862 and 1890 land grant institutions instead of TCUs.听听

Beyond the federal government鈥檚 dedicated annual funding to Native American education, tribal educational entities are also engaging in creative ways to access the historic levels of place-based investment Congress passed since 2021. For example, the National Science Foundation鈥檚 (NSF) Regional Innovation Engines program awarded Navajo Technical University a $1 million development grant for its program, which seeks to 鈥渋nvolve tribal communities in technology transfer and advanced manufacturing.鈥� This grant comes during a period of unprecedented investment in semiconductor fabrication labs in and around the Phoenix region by manufacturers such as TSMC and Intel. Tribal communities and Native-led organizations have also seen an influx in investment through the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, Inflation Reduction Act, and American Rescue Plan Act, which have provided multiple channels of funding for Native-led workforce training, cluster development, entrepreneurial ecosystem-building, broadband infrastructure, and planning and technical assistance. Investments like these demonstrate the value of asset-based approaches to investment in Indian Country by recognizing the value of Native identity, culture, and community in the development and implementation of tribal-serving programs.听

The 麻豆视传媒免费观看 administration enabled these investments by prioritizing tribes and Native-led entities in its program guidance and notices of funding opportunities across major federal place-based programs such as the Economic Development Administration鈥檚 (EDA) Build Back Better Regional Challenge, Recompete Pilot Program, and Regional Technology and Innovation Hubs (Tech Hubs), as well as the aforementioned NSF Regional Innovation Engines program. The EDA鈥檚 programs explicitly name Indian tribes or consortia of Indian tribes as eligible applicants, and the NSF similarly notes that tribal nations are eligible to submit proposals as the lead organization. The EDA also notes that it may establish a maximum investment rate of up to 100% for Indian tribe projects across its programs, and specifically namechecks TCUs as an eligible higher education institution within the Tech Hubs program. Meanwhile, the NSF notes that proposals that may impact the resources or interests of a federally recognized tribal nation will not be awarded funding without prior written approval from the relevant tribal nation. Each of these provisions has helped create pathways for Native communities and Native educational institutions to access these important sources of place-based funding, and should be maintained and enhanced.听

Increasing public awareness of Native American history faces growing headwinds听

Unfortunately, many Americans remain unaware of these recent successes and ongoing challenges. This is in part because most schools in the United States , limiting Native American students鈥� ability to learn about their own history in school and giving students of all backgrounds the false impression that major events involving Native American people happened centuries ago.听听

Moreover, the and other efforts to suppress aspects of U.S. history in schools and public discourse threaten recent gains such as the boarding schools report. Examples of these policies include the first Trump administration鈥檚 , state efforts to in educational settings, and proposals such as Project 2025鈥檚 plan to . Each of these ideas puts at risk.听听

Finally, efforts to raise awareness of the boarding schools and their history can provoke backlash. This has been the case in Canada, where a national dialogue around its similar system of 鈥渞esidential schools鈥� sparked a movement. These trends could emerge in the U.S. For example, as awareness of the federal Indian boarding schools has grown, some commentators have already begun to , or even insist they were good for Native American children. As such, it鈥檚 essential that policymakers allow our full history to be taught to counter these false and problematic ideas.听

What additional policy actions are needed?听

Ensuring that modern education and economic development policies translate into actual benefits for tribes will not only require an increase in the level of investment reaching these communities, but also structural change that centers tribes in curriculum design and operational structure; investments in wraparound services that address the unique crises students in Indian Country face; and efforts to educate the public about historic and present harms in Native American communities.听听听

To that end, beyond documenting the scope and scale of the boarding school system, the Interior Department鈥檚 report also outlines a series of policy steps the federal government should take to continue the process of reconciliation and healing from the boarding school era. The report :听听

1. 鈥淎cknowledge, apologize, repudiate, and affirm鈥� the federal government鈥檚 role in the boarding school system.听
2. 鈥淚nvest in remedies to the present-day impacts of the federal Indian boarding school system,鈥� including funding for individual and community healing; family preservation and reunification; violence prevention; high-quality elementary, secondary, and higher education for Native American students; and the revitalization of Indigenous languages.听
3. 鈥淏uild a national memorial鈥� to acknowledge and commemorate the experiences of tribes and Native American people within the boarding schools.听
4. 鈥淚dentify and repatriate children who never returned from federal Indian boarding schools鈥� to their tribes and families.听
5. 鈥淩eturn former federal Indian boarding school sites鈥� to U.S. government or tribal ownership.听
6. 鈥淭ell the story of federal Indian boarding schools鈥� through academic, government, and tribal channels, with an emphasis on sharing firsthand accounts.听
7. 鈥淚nvest in further research鈥� into the present-day health and economic impacts of the boarding school system, as well as related policies such as child removal, confinement, and forced assimilation.听
8. 鈥淎dvance international relationships鈥� with other nations that have their own histories of Indigenous boarding schools, including Canada, Australia, and New Zealand.听

The federal government has already taken an important first step by explicitly apologizing for its central role in the boarding school system. It is now essential to act on the other recommendations outlined in the report, which would make significant early progress in remedying the ongoing legacy of harm that the boarding schools have left in many Native communities. Beyond the federal government, other organizations such as the and the have put forward policy agendas to help Native communities and the nation as a whole heal from the impacts of the boarding schools.听

This piece does not aim to replicate the work of those organizations. Rather, what follows is a set of actions that federal, state, and local policymakers can take to complement those efforts by bolstering investment in Native American communities, protecting programs that support Native American students, and increasing our understanding of Native American student well-being.听

First, policymakers should take steps to ensure that progress made to date isn鈥檛 undermined. Given the central role that federal agencies play in educating Native students and supporting tribal economies, it鈥檚 critical that Congress prevent the incoming Trump administration from taking some of the destructive steps proposed on the campaign trail, such as .听

Likewise, while some states have enacted reparative policies for Native American students (such as tuition waivers, scholarships, and on-campus supports), those policies may now be at risk from recent judicial rulings that have , as well as potential Trump administration executive actions. In response, Congress should clarify that tribal citizenship is a political designation, not a racial one, and that actions to support tribal self-governance and economic well-being, inclusive of education policy, are not affected by recent federal court rulings. Such a policy could draw on the 1974 Supreme Court case , which ruled that federal hiring preferences for tribal citizens was based on the federal government鈥檚 political relationship with tribes and did not constitute racial discrimination because it was 鈥渘ot even a 鈥榬acial鈥� preference.鈥� This approach would empower policymakers and educational institutions to safeguard Native American student policies that are based on tribal citizenship.听

Next, policymakers at all levels must do more to increase awareness of Native American history and remove barriers to teaching it. To do so, Congress should pass an 鈥淚ndigenous Education for All鈥� law that ensures Native American history, including 20th and 21st century history, is taught at all schools that receive federal funding. Such laws have a strong bipartisan history. In 1999, Montana took the groundbreaking step of passing the first act, which has been followed by more recent state efforts such as Minnesota鈥檚 2023 act. From there, Congress should provide funding to public elementary and secondary schools鈥攚hich educate the vast majority of Native American students today鈥攖o develop culturally relevant pedagogies for Native American students, deepen relationships with local and regional tribes, and provide opportunities such as Indigenous language learning in school.听

On the higher education side, Congress should bring TCUs into funding parity with other land grant institutions. Raising TCU land grant capacity funding to $11.6 million per year鈥攖o match the funding that 1862 land grant institutions receive鈥攚ould provide an additional $400 million per year to those institutions. These resources can be complemented by providing greater funding for institutions through the . Congress should also develop more robust funding streams for other institutions that serve Native American students, such as Native American-Serving Nontribal Institutions. Doing so would help improve institutional capacity, individual economic well-being, and tribal community prosperity.听

Policymakers should also prioritize improving data about Native American students and giving tribes better access to data on their own citizens. Data on Native American students and individuals currently suffers from a variety of shortcomings. In some cases, unreliable sample sizes in government surveys make drawing statistically significant conclusions about Native populations impossible. In other cases, the data is incomplete. For example, the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS), the federal government鈥檚 higher education database, does not disaggregate any information on Native American students who are either Latino or Hispanic or multiracial, who combined account for over 75% of all Native Americans. Nor does it collect any data on student tribal affiliation. These decisions make it impossible for researchers and tribes themselves to get a fuller picture of the successes and challenges for Native American students in higher education. Policymakers should increase funding to improve the presence of Native American people in government surveys, and from the Office of Management and Budget to improve data collection practices about Native American students in education data. Policymakers can complement these efforts with steps such as funding investments into developing greater in-house data capacity for tribes; working with tribes to develop appropriate systems to make gathering, analyzing, and reporting data more efficient; developing a federal framework to protect tribal data sovereignty; and providing greater funding for digital literacy in tribal communities.听

To support these efforts, Congress should develop a set of robust, place-based investments into tribes and Native American communities, leveraging educational institutions and tribal educational offices as key economic and community development anchors. As discussed above, existing place-based federal programs鈥攕uch as the Build Back Better Regional Challenge, Recompete Pilot Program, Tech Hubs, and NSF Regional Innovation Engines鈥攃an provide templates for the types of investments that leverage educational institutions鈥� ability to promote community and economic development in places, as well as the provisions that federal agencies should implement to ensure Native American communities can access those funding streams. In addition to developing a new set of place-based programs for Native American communities, policymakers can take steps to make all place-based programs even more accessible to Indian Country. For example, in future programs, Congress could provide additional funding for agencies to conduct proactive outreach to tribes to inform them about these programs and funding opportunities, as well as provide financial and technical assistance to tribes to defray the costs of applying for and implementing federal programs of this size. Given that tribes and TCUs frequently have fewer available resources than other governmental and higher education institutions, this type of additional proactive investment is needed to ensure Native communities truly have an equal shot at receiving federal funding. Policymakers should also attempt to adhere to principles for investing in Native American communities laid out by organizations such as United South and Eastern Tribes, Inc. in their , including favoring formula grants over competitive grants and eliminating statutory restrictions on spending to best enable tribal self-determination.听

Unfortunately, given the stated priorities of the incoming Trump administration and 119th Congress, extensive federal action in support of Native American students and tribal economies is unlikely. Thus, states, municipalities, and philanthropic organizations should in the coming years explore opportunities to execute some of these recommendations on their own. For example, states could expand the funding they provide to TCUs. While historically states have not funded TCUs, these institutions play an important role in supporting rural higher education as well as economic and workforce development in communities that state public colleges and universities do not serve鈥攇iving states a compelling economic reason to provide funding. States could also explore developing state-level funding streams to invest in tribal communities, and partner with tribes to share data these institutions collect on tribal citizenship and Native student education (from early childhood through postsecondary). Philanthropic organizations must also step up their investment in Native communities and Native education. Currently, , meaning there is significant opportunity for philanthropy to do more to support Indian Country. Philanthropic funding is particularly critical in a moment such as the current one, when opportunities for federal action may be scarce.听

This list of policy items should not be taken as exhaustive. Additional investments are necessary, ranging from developing and recruiting top talent to work in Native-serving educational institutions to expanding child care and pre-K in tribal communities, among many others. An array of Native-led and Native-serving organizations have identified additional policy actions to support Native American students and educational institutions. Organizations such as the and the have identified specific policy needs for students in elementary through higher education. The has developed research and policy agendas for TCUs in areas such as long-term sustainability, pathways for student success, and academic quality. Finally, a recently published landscape analysis on Native American higher education from recommends a variety of policies and best practices for the federal government, educational institutions, and philanthropy, ranging from improving data quality and supporting data sovereignty to developing more robust education-to-employment pathways and incorporating traditional knowledge into skills training. While the list of policy needs is long, it will take significant and sustained investment to overcome the destructive legacy of a century of government-sponsored boarding schools.听

Conclusion听

While it鈥檚 important that the U.S. government has made historic levels of investment into Indian Country since 2020, it鈥檚 clear that additional efforts are needed to invest in Native communities and raise awareness of some of the most critical historical issues that continue to affect Native American people today.听

So, while the Interior Department鈥檚 boarding school report and President 麻豆视传媒免费观看鈥檚 apology for the federal government鈥檚 involvement in the boarding schools have likely stirred up significant trauma and complicated feelings for both Native and non-Native people alike, they come at an important time. By gaining a deeper knowledge of the boarding schools and other policies levied against Native Americans, individuals can more easily understand the lingering health, economic, and other impacts that U.S. government actions have on the survivors of those policies and their descendants.听

Moving forward, what is needed is not a retreat from our history, but rather new resources to learn from it and respond to its modern effects, with the goal of creating a nation where all students, communities, and cultures can thrive.听

Robert Maxim is a citizen of the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe and a descendant of听, a survivor of the Carlisle Indian Industrial School.