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Geraldine Lee Shingoose, a Canadian residential school survivor, was abused as an Indigenous girl at a Saskatchewan school.
These schools, which were run by the government and operated primarily by the Catholic Church, were part of the policy of assimilating indigenous children and destroying their cultures and languages.
From 1863 to 1998, more than 150,000 indigenous children were separated from their families and placed in these boarding schools. Today, the terrifying discovery of the remains of 215 children who were students at one such school, the Kamloops Indian Residential School, has once again brought into sharp focus the abuses taking place there.
A report by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) estimated that around 6,000 children had died in boarding schools.
Their bodies rarely returned home and many were buried in unmarked graves. Canada issued a formal apology in 2008. The Catholic Church had staff in many schools, but did not apologize directly.
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