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Chemawa Indian School in Salem — the oldest continuously operated residential boarding school for Native American students in the United States — may come under federal review following U.S. Department of the Interior Secretary Deb Haaland's call for the government to investigate its past oversight of such schools.
Located just east of Keizer Station, Chemawa had about 335 students enrolled as of October 2019. The off-reservation institution is more than 125 years old and one of only four Native American residential boarding schools still in existence in the United States and run by federal agencies.
That said, there are 183 federally-funded elementary and secondary schools total. Of those, 53 are operated by the Bureau of Indian Education, including Chemawa, and 130 are tribally controlled under BIE contracts or grants.