{"id":65404,"date":"2019-12-09T16:12:40","date_gmt":"2019-12-09T16:12:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/fort-lewis-college-re-examines-its-past\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T14:01:21","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T14:01:21","slug":"fort-lewis-college-re-examines-its-past","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/fort-lewis-college-re-examines-its-past\/","title":{"rendered":"Fort Lewis College re-examines its past"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Majel
Majel Boxer, professor of Native American and indigenous studies at Fort Lewis College, discusses the panels mounted in stone in the walk-through area of the FLC Clock Tower. A committee will consider updating the panels to present a more realistic synopsis of the college\u2019s history as a boarding school for Native American students.<\/span>Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

<\/p>\n

The symbolic heart of Fort Lewis College, the Clock Tower, presents a series of panels highlighting the school\u2019s history \u2013 panels that have drawn scrutiny in recent years for seemingly glossing over or inaccurately portraying a painful period when the school served as a boarding school for Native American students.<\/p>\n

Majel Boxer, associate professor of Native American and indigenous studies, said the period of boarding schools for Native American students across the country \u2013 including from 1891 to 1910 at FLC \u2013 is important to present more realistically.<\/p>\n

\u201cAny history of FLC<\/a> needs to include the Indian boarding school history accurately with the complexity it deserves \u2013 including the seriously damaging aspects it had for many families as a form of forced assimilation into the dominant European culture,\u201d Boxer said.<\/p>\n

She joined about a dozen other faculty, students and staff members Thursday at the Clock Tower, one of the first gatherings of the FLC History Committee.<\/p>\n

In the upcoming academic year, the committee will hear from people on campus and among the wider communities in Southwest Colorado and the Four Corners as it takes suggestions about updating the panels to present a more realistic synopsis of the institution\u2019s history.<\/p>\n

The History Committee will hold its first public meeting, an open session, this week.<\/p>\n

\"Panels
Panels are mounted in stone in the walk-through area of the Fort Lewis College Clock Tower. A committee will consider updating the panels to present a more realistic synopsis of the college\u2019s history as a boarding school for Native American students.<\/span>Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

During the spring semester, the group plans to reach out for input from the Southern Ute Indian Tribe, the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe, Jicarilla Apache tribe in New Mexico, the Navajo Nation, the pueblos in New Mexico and other tribes in Arizona.<\/p>\n

The group will work during the next academic year to recommend updated wording and presentations on a dozen or so panels that highlight the institution\u2019s history since its inception as a military fort in Pagosa Springs in 1878 \u2013 paying particular attention to the period when the school served as a boarding school.<\/p>\n

At the end of the academic year, the committee will provide suggestions for how to move forward to address the public displays to FLC President Tom Stritikus.<\/p>\n

Jesse Peters, dean of the School of Arts and Sciences, who will head the committee, said acknowledging the detrimental effects of the boarding school system is a step \u201ctoward healing and reconciling a past that has too often been ignored or altered.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAt a college that once was a boarding school and that enrolls 41% Native American students, we should be a leader in addressing that particular past,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

In recent years, Peters said, several faculty, students and staff members have brought up concerns about the written and visual rhetoric used to describe the school\u2019s history.<\/p>\n

The increased awareness, along with a renewed focus on students, led Stritikus to the decision to examine the public displays of FLC\u2019s history.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe wants an inclusive process that welcomes many voices and perspectives, particularly those of Native American students, staff, faculty, alumni and community members,\u201d Peters said.<\/p>\n

\"A
A committee formed to review panels mounted in stone in the walk-through area of the Fort Lewis College Clock Tower gathers Thursday to discuss a process for updating the panels.<\/span>Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"A
A statement tacked to the Fort Lewis College Clock Tower explains the effort to update a dozen panels that depict the college\u2019s history as a boarding school for Native Americans.<\/span>Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

At Stritikus\u2019 direction, a plaque has gone up at the Clock Tower saying the school understands the panels present an incomplete and not fully inclusive account of its history and that work has begun to update them.<\/p>\n

How the panels are updated and refined is yet to be determined, Peters said. There is no predetermined outcome of the committee\u2019s work examining the panels and other public displays of FLC history.<\/p>\n

Peters said: \u201cWe may replace the panels, clarify the panels or we may acknowledge the history in other ways. The paramount concern is making sure that indigenous peoples, communities and nations have voice and provide guidance in how the boarding school history is represented. There may be other facets of FLC\u2019s history we examine, but addressing the boarding school history is the first step.\u201d<\/p>\n

Boxer said it is also important to note FLC\u2019s role as a Native American-serving institution built on the foundation of an agreement between the federal government and the state. The federal government turned over property and buildings at the Old Fort with an agreement that the school would provide educational services to Native Americans without charging them tuition.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a positive thing that was done for students, and it is one of the few treaties or agreements that has not been violated,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Stritikus said telling the institution\u2019s history in all its complexity is important.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe haven\u2019t told the full story of Fort Lewis in a way that considers the students and community members affected by boarding schools, and we think it\u2019s important we do that now,\u201d he said. \u201cTelling the full historical story of Fort Lewis allows us to begin to reconcile the contradiction of our genesis with our current role as a Native-serving non-tribal college.\u201d<\/p>\n

parmijo @durangoherald.com<\/em><\/p>\n

\n

If you go<\/h4>\n

The Fort Lewis College History Committee will hold its first public meeting, an open session, from 11 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Friday in the Vallecito Room in the Student Union.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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