when was the first indian residential school opened in canada
List of Indian residential schools in Canada The following is a list of Canadian Indian residential schools[1] The first residential schools were set up in the 1840s with the last residential school closing in 1997.[2][3][4]
Canadian Indian residential school system After a failure to assimilate Indigenous children by early missionaries in the 17th century, educational programs were not widely attempted again by religious officials until the 1820s, prior to the introduction of state-sanctioned operations.[13] Included among them was a school established by John West, an Anglican missionary, at the Red River Colony in what is today Manitoba.[4]:50 Protestant missionaries also opened residential schools in the current Ontario region, spreading Christianity and working to encourage Indigenous peoples to adopt subsistence agriculture as a way to ensure they would not return to their original, nomadic ways of life upon graduation.[14]
Canadian Indian residential school system In 1969, after years of sharing power with churches, the DIA took sole control of the residential school system.[15][30]:79–84 The last residential school operated by the Canadian government, Gordon Indian Residential School in Saskatchewan, was closed in 1996.[35] Residential schools operated in every Canadian province and territory with the exception of New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island.[7] It is estimated that the number of residential schools reached its peak in the early 1930s with 80 schools and more than 17,000 enrolled students. About 150,000 children are believed to have attended a residential school over the course of the system's existence.[4]:2–3[36]
Canadian Indian residential school system Although many of these early schools were open for only a short time, efforts persisted. The Mohawk Institute Residential School, the oldest, continuously operated residential school in Canada, opened in 1834 on Six Nations of the Grand River near Brantford, Ontario. Administered by the Anglican Church, the facility opened as the Mechanics' Institute, a day school for boys, in 1828 and became a boarding school four years later when it accepted its first boarders and began admitting female students. It remained in operation until June 30, 1970.[15]