In a historical photo, students at the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, in March 1892. Photo: J.N. Choate, courtesy of the Cumberland County Historical Society, Carlisle, Pennsylvania 

In a historical photo, a group of Native American students dressed in school uniforms standing in an open lawn

Chemawa Indian School, located in Oregon, is the oldest, continuously operating non-reservation boarding school in the United States. Photo courtesy of Historic American Buildings Survey, Library of Congress

The exterior of a large rectangular two story building set on a large front lawn with pine trees in front of it

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The federal government…took deliberate and strategic actions through federal Indian boarding school policies to isolate children from their families.

School girls participating in a festival at the Albuquerque Indian School in New Mexico about 1912. Photo from US Department of the Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs photograph, courtesy of the National Archives and Records Administration, ARC 292876 

In a historical photo, group of Native American school girls dressed in white festival attire 

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Some people have said, ‘I never cried. I talked about it before, but I never cried.’ Tears are healing.

After federally funded schools separated Indigenous families, a new oral history initiative is working to record the stories of still-living survivors and facilitate healing.

A Permanent Collection: The Department of the Interior’s Federal Indian Boarding School Initiative

In a historical photo, young Native American children learn to sing a song at the Carlisle Indian Industrial School. Carlisle, Pennsylvania. Photo: F. Johnston, courtesy of the Cumberland County Historical Society, Carlisle, Pennsylvania 

A group of young Native American school children dressed in uniforms in a classroom

Reckoning with the Devastating Legacy of Federal Indian Boarding School Policies

Artists as Catalysts

Artists as Catalysts Navigation Image

Beyond Incarceration

A side profile of a Black poet who is wearing glasses and a hat with a feather hat pin.

Borderlands Cultures

In portrait orientation, an aerial view of a major highway running parallel to a large border wall set on a hilly landscape

Civic Engagement

A man in a brown jacket stands in front of blue bulletin board that is covered with papers and advertisements  

Evolving Higher Education

A vertical image of an Indigenous person who is sitting on a chair in front of a backdrop.

Expanding Public Knowledge

An interior room filled with audio and video equipment 

Monuments and Memory

A multicolored painted totem pole set in front of a foggy forest landscape

Multivocality

Five people stand together in a group photo. They are laughing and smiling.

Power of the Word

Five colorful neon signs hang on the wall with messages that include, "Freedom cannot wait," "Brown owned," and "America is for Dreamers."

Public Places‚ Public Stories

A group of Indigenous Maskoke people stand and sit in the wooden frame of a structure in a woods

Puerto Rico and Its Diaspora

In a vertical image, a black leather vest is adorned with colorful pins across the front of it. Embroidery on the vest reads: "Felícitas "La Prieta" Méndez" 

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