Native American Boarding Schools

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We read Cheyenne Again by Eve Bunting and were saddened at the thought of kids being sent to boarding schools to be taught things that were so different from their own way of life. We didn't think it was fair. We wanted Young Bull to get away from the boarding school, and we didn't want him to have to learn the white man's way. It made us angry. We read about Native American boarding schools from Encyclopedias and on the internet, and the accounts we read made us even angrier. We found the facts below from the last page of Cheyenne Again.

"In the late 1880s there were 23 off reserve Indian Boarding Schools across U.S.A. The first Indian Boarding school to be established was Carlisle in Pennsylvania. Among other boarding schools such as Chemawa in Oregon, Chilocco in Oklahoma, Genoa in Nebraska, and Haskell in Kansas. Boarding schools now are more sensitive to the students needs and encourage them to treasure their skills and take pride in their heritage."

It made us worry when we read that boarding schools still exist, even though it says they are now more sensitive. Sometimes, history and the things people did are hard for us to understand, or agree with. We sometimes wish we could go back and change the way things happened. The picture above shows American Horse with children and relatives during an 1882 visit to the Carlisle Indian School. The picture reminds of when Young Bull had to cut his hair and start wearing different clothes, and it makes us sad.