Assimilation Plans that Backfired
On top of cruel treatment, Indigenous children in mandatory boarding schools were often poorly housed. They were kept in overcrowded dormitories, with poor sanitation, unclean water, no or inadequate sewage, and insufficient heating to cope with Canada’s harsh winters. Between that and an absence of medical care, diseases such as influenza and tuberculosis were rife. Federal funding was tied to enrollment figures, but that backfired because schools boosted their figures by enrolling sick children. About 150,000 Indigenous kids were placed in mandatory schools. Because of bad record keeping, the number of school deaths is unknown, but estimates range from a low of 3200 to highs of more than 30,000.
The system backfired in other ways. Perhaps the final tragic twist in a tale already full of the tragic is that the end result of the Indigenous children’s education was often adults unable to fit back into their original communities. After years of speaking only English or French in boarding schools, many had forgotten their Indigenous languages by the time they graduated, and were no longer able to communicate with their relatives. However, they were still Indigenous. Despite the Residential School System’s professed assimilationist intent, they were denied assimilation because of the racist and exclusionary attitudes of mainstream white Canadian society.