American Indian Boarding Schools Term Paper by serendipity

This paper explains that the "Friends of the American Indians" believed that education was the only answer to the "Indian problem" to assimilate Native Americans into Euro-American society. The author points out that, whereas, the mission schools were traditionally located on the reservations, the "retraining" process meant that the government-influenced boarding schools were located off of the reservations, usually many miles away from families, so that many children were not able to see their families for years at a time. The paper relates that, although the tribal traditionalists strongly were opposed to families sending their children to distant schools to learn the "white man's" ways, grinding poverty and the overwhelming hopelessness of reservation life caused many Indian parents to consider the possibility of sending their children to find a more prosperous life.