2025 - #001: CALL TO PROTECT THE NATIONAL ORAL HISTORY PROJECT OF U.S. INDIAN BOARDING SCHOOL SURVIVORS

WHEREAS, the National Indian Education Association (NIEA) was established in 1970 for the purpose of advocating, planning, and promoting the unique and special educational needs of American Indians, Alaska Natives, and Native Hawaiians; and

WHEREAS, NIEA as the largest national Native organization of American Indian, Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian educators, administrators, parents, and students in the United States, provides a forum to discuss and act upon issues affecting the education of Indian and Native people; and

WHEREAS, the promotion, protection and preservation of Tribal members' health, welfare and human rights is a priority for all Tribal Nations; and

WHEREAS, attempts to destroy American Indian, Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian (Native) cultures, religions, and languages through assimilationist practices and policies can be traced to the early 17th century and in the founding charters of some of the oldest educational institutions in the United States; and

WHEREAS, as early as 1800, and until 1969, the Federal Government directly or indirectly supported approximately 526 Indian Boarding Schools across 38 States; and

WHEREAS, Native children were required by law to attend boarding schools with the intended purposes of stripping them of their languages, cultures, and Indigenous lifeways; and

WHEREAS, Native children, as young as 3 years old, were forcibly removed from their homes and sent to Indian Boarding Schools located throughout the United States; and

WHEREAS, Native peoples continue to experience intergenerational trauma alongside cultural and familial disruption from experiences rooted in Indian Boarding Schools Policies, which divided family structures, damaged cultures and individual identities, and inflicted chronic physical and psychological ramifications to our children, families, communities, and Nations; and

WHEREAS, efforts to preserve personal histories and support the healing journeys of Indian boarding school survivors remain an ongoing initiative in a cooperative agreement between the U.S. Department of the Interior and the National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition in the, first of its kind, National Oral History Collection of Indian Boarding School Survivors (Oral History Project), set to culminate in 2026; and

WHEREAS, the Oral History Project has worked with Tribal leadership, community helpers, and sustained culturally responsive gatherings to collect and preserve personal narratives, and contributed to the intergenerational healing of Tribal citizens and the Tribal Nations they belong to; and

WHEREAS, the Oral History Project has interviewed over two hundred Indian boarding school survivors from twelve regions throughout Indian Country and recorded their testimonies; and

WHEREAS, the Oral History Project is an important contribution as a vital, on-the-ground effort to support Indian Country in addressing the harms and ongoing intergenerational impacts of the Federal Indian Boarding School Policy era; and

WHEREAS, Indian boarding school survivors are the sons and daughters of sovereign Tribal Nations, who as elders–some as old as 96 years of age–have expressed their urgency and desire to contribute to the Oral History Project, stating that they do not know how much time they have left; and

WHEREAS, Tribal Nations remain eager to continue the Oral History Project with funds

previously appropriated by the United States Congress and dedicated to the initiative; and

WHEREAS, Tribal programs and initiatives at the federal level, such as the Oral History Project, are fundamental to the trust and treaty responsibility and should not be considered discretionary obligations; and

WHEREAS, the National Endowment for the Humanities cancellation of $1.6 million in critical federal funding dedicated to Indian boarding school research, education, and preservation has provoked serious challenges and derailed Native-led efforts to investigate, learn, and support healing in Tribal communities; and

THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED, that the National Indian Education Association (NIEA) calls on the U.S. Department of the Interior to maintain the National Oral History Collection of Indian Boarding School Survivors (Oral History Project) as a priority and to continue the Oral History Project as planned with the congressionally-appropriated funds already allocated, as a responsibility of the Federal Government to continue fulfilling its trust obligation to Tribal Nations; and

BE IT FINALLY RESOLVED, that this resolution shall be the policy of NIEA until it is withdrawn or modified by subsequent resolution.