The Intergenerational Legacy of Indian Residential Schools

From the late nineteenth century until the end of the twentieth century, the Canadian government collaborated with Christian churches to operate a network of boarding schools for Indigenous children to culturally and economically assimilate them. These children were taken from their families and placed into residential schools, where they were to be assimilated into the Eurocentric culture of the dominant society. Using a unique restricted-access database that asked Indigenous respondents about their family history with residential schools, in addition to questions on socioeconomic outcomes, I study the intergenerational effects of these schools. Despite previous research showing that residential schools increased human capital accumulation among attendees, I find that residential schools are associated with lower educational attainment among subsequent generations. I present evidence consistent with the notion that both cultural detachment and a breakdown in family relationships contributed to a reversal of the standard relationship between parents' and children's human capital. Encouragingly, I find suggestive evidence that greater access to cultural centers might buffer the harmful legacy of this historical trauma.