I wake up and go to a school that I do not want to go to. I speak a language that I do not want to speak. I am beaten for speaking Ojibwemowin.

I am punished for acting out my culture. Sent to sit in the cold corner, where the heat does not reach. Taken from my family. Taken from my home. Taken from my culture. I am being stripped from my culture in this “school”, rather wounds are being created rather than learning. 

I am sent to work for farmers. Hot sun beats down on me while I am out on the field. I make only $1 a week and all I want to do is go back to my family. The farmers complain about my attitude, homesickness, and depressed mode. I just want to go home. They don’t know the pain of being taken from your home and told your way of life is incorrect.  

I am just one of these 430 Native Americans taken from my home and put into this one boarding school. Taken from their families. Taken from their homes. Taken from their culture. The culture has been ripped away from us as we are assimilated into European culture at this school. For 40 years our cultures were forced to be forgotten and our people changed.