Affiliated with the Bureau of Indian Education, or BIE, the Santa Fe Indian School in front of you is a tribal boarding secondary school here in Santa Fe, New Mexico. The Federal Government established this institution to educate Native American children from tribes throughout the Southwestern United States, and while the school gives its founding date as 1890, contemporary reports show 40 students in April 1885 and 200 students in April 1887. Early enrollment included young people from Laguna Pueblo, Santo Domingo Pueblo, San Felipe Pueblo, and Zuni Pueblo.
The original purpose was an attempt to assimilate Native American children into the wider United States culture and economy — a difficult and complicated history that shaped generations. In 1975 the All Indian Pueblo Council (AIPC) was formed; it became the first Indian organization to use existing laws to contract education for their children and ultimately leveraged complete control of the school and curriculum. With the passing of the SFIS Act in 2001, the school took ownership of the land; today the school resides in the form of a trust held by the nineteen Pueblo Governors of New Mexico.
Notice the campus now held in trust by nineteen Pueblo Governors.