Latest news with #boardingSchools
The Independent
29-05-2025
- General
- The Independent
China accused of ‘indoctrinating' Tibetan children from age of four with state-run boarding schools
Rights activists have accused Chinese authorities of indoctrinating Tibetan children and eroding their culture by forcing them to attend 'colonial' boarding schools. The Tibet Action Institute, a movement advocating for Tibetan independence founded by Tibetan-Canadian activist Lhadon Tethong, published a new report on Thursday warning that schools are teaching children as young as four to be loyal to the Chinese Communist Party. The activists estimate one million children in the Tibet Autonomous Region and Tibetan districts study at such boarding schools, though the number is difficult to confirm. The group has claimed that the schools are a smaller part of a broader strategy to dilute Tibetan identity and assimilate Tibetans into the majority Chinese culture, with the Xi Jinping-led government perceiving Tibetan identity as a 'threat'. China has shuttered village schools across Tibet and replaced them with centralised boarding schools over the last dozen years, leaving parents with little choice but to send their children to such facilities. Many students come from remote farming villages and live at the schools full-time. Through these boarding schools, the report warned, the Chinese government was trying 'to deracinate Tibetan children from their culture, language, and identity'. The report found students were restricted from enrolling in Tibetan language classes or engaging in religious activities. Tibetans view the practice of their language as the fundamental guarantee of their future as a distinct people within the broader Chinese region. The group said it documented numerous instances of negligence and abuse in Tibetan boarding schools. "Tibetan children's lives are being irrevocably altered to serve the purposes of the Chinese government," the Tibet Action Institute said after conducting 15 in-depth interviews with Tibetans between 2023 and 2024. It added: "The separation from family and deliberate reshaping of children's identity in boarding schools is causing emotional and psychological harm, including attachment trauma and alienation." The report quotes a Tibetan who fled to India saying that "the indoctrination process begins from a very young age," when children are removed from their parents. "Children cannot study Tibetan and Tibetan history. They are taught the Chinese language and the history of China written by Chinese writers," the interviewee was quoted as saying. Another person alleged that the materials on classroom walls were in Chinese, including pictures of leaders such as Mr Xi, Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping. "Xi Jinping Thought" is taught in classes as part of the curriculum, the person said. "Essays and drawings were judged based on how much we were able to praise the Party, the state, and the army." The group found that in 2022, a 13-year-old Tibetan girl with underlying medical conditions died after her family persistently tried to reach her with prescription medicine at her boarding school. The school first neglected to provide the medicine, and then failed to seek medical attention, it added. China has long sought to eradicate any possibility of unrest in regions home to sizeable ethnic populations by imprisoning dissenters, reshaping societies and religions to align them with the views of the Communist party. The approach has hardened in the past decade under the leadership of Mr Xi, who has been accused of a brutal crackdown on the Uyghur community in the Xinjiang region north of Tibet. The Chinese government has repeatedly denied allegations of human rights abuses in Tibet, as well as other regions like Xinjiang. Xu Zhitao, vice chair of the Tibet region's government, rejected similar criticism in 2023, arguing that China opened the boarding school system to improve education for children from remote areas. 'The claim that Tibetan children are forced to go to boarding schools is deliberate smearing with an ulterior motive,' he told reporters at the release of an official report on the Communist Party's policies in Tibet. He said the curriculum at the schools included Tibetan language and culture. 'These are all implemented to effectively secure our Tibetan children's rights to access high-quality education, and it is an important expression of the development and progress of human rights in Tibet.' The Chinese government and Tibet's government-in-exile offer competing versions of whether the remote, mountainous territory was historically ruled as part of China, or whether it has legitimate claims to independence or autonomy. "A generation of Tibetan children is being harmed by China's colonial boarding school policy – socially, emotionally, and psychologically,' said Lhadon Tethong, the co-founder and director of Tibet Action Institute. 'The lifelong negative impact on each of these children and their families, and on the future health of Tibetan society overall, cannot be overstated. The international community must step up all efforts to urgently push the Chinese government to abolish this abusive and coercive system.' In February 2023, a group of UN experts raised alarm over reports of Tibetan children being separated form their families. "We are alarmed by what appears to be a policy of forced assimilation of the Tibetan identity into the dominant Han-Chinese majority, through a series of oppressive actions against Tibetan educational, religious, and linguistic institutions," the UN experts said. The rights group urged the UN and concerned governments to call on the Chinese government to conduct a public investigation into the alleged abuses, deaths, and mental health concerns of Tibetan children in Chinese state-run boarding schools.
Washington Post
24-05-2025
- Politics
- Washington Post
Tribes sue U.S. government over deaths, abuse at boarding schools
Two Native American tribes filed a class-action lawsuit on Thursday against the U.S. government for its role in running a system of boarding schools for more than a century that separated Native children from their families in an attempt to eradicate their language and culture and force them to assimilate into White society.
The Independent
22-05-2025
- Politics
- The Independent
Tribes say the U.S. misappropriated funds to pay for Native American boarding schools
Two tribal nations filed a lawsuit Thursday saying that the federal government used the trust fund money of tribes to pay for boarding schools where generations of Native children were systematically abused. In the lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania, the Wichita Tribe and the Washoe Tribe of Nevada and California said that by the U.S. government's own admission, the schools were funded using money raised by forcing tribal nations into treaties to cede their lands. That money was to be held in trust for the collective benefit of tribes. 'The United States Government, the trustee over Native children's education and these funds, has never accounted for the funds that it took, or detailed how, or even whether, those funds were ultimately expended. It has failed to identify any funds that remain,' according to the lawsuit. The lawsuit was filed against Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the Bureau of Indian Education. A spokesperson for the Interior declined to comment on pending litigation. In 2022, the U.S. Department of the Interior, under the direction of Secretary Deb Haaland, the first Native American to run the agency, released a scathing report on the legacy of the boarding school era, in which Native children were stolen from their homes, forced to assimilate, and in many cases physically, sexually and mentally abused. Countless children died at the schools, many of whom were buried in unmarked graves at the institutions. That report detailed the U.S. government's intentions of using the boarding schools as a way to both strip Native children of their culture and dispossess their tribal nations of land. The tribes are asking the court to make the U.S. account for the estimated $23.3 billion it appropriated for the boarding school program, detail how that money was invested, and list the remaining funds that were taken by U.S. and allocated for the education of Native children. Last year, President Joe Biden issued a formal apology for the government's boarding school policy, calling it 'a sin on our soul' and 'one of the most horrific chapters' in American history. But in April, the administration of President Donald Trump cut $1.6 million from projects meant to capture and digitize stories of boarding school survivors.
Associated Press
22-05-2025
- Politics
- Associated Press
Tribes say the U.S. misappropriated funds to pay for Native American boarding schools
Two tribal nations filed a lawsuit Thursday saying that the federal government used the trust fund money of tribes to pay for boarding schools where generations of Native children were systematically abused. In the lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania, the Wichita Tribe and the Washoe Tribe of Nevada and California said that by the U.S. government's own admission, the schools were funded using money raised by forcing tribal nations into treaties to cede their lands. That money was to be held in trust for the collective benefit of tribes. 'The United States Government, the trustee over Native children's education and these funds, has never accounted for the funds that it took, or detailed how, or even whether, those funds were ultimately expended. It has failed to identify any funds that remain,' according to the lawsuit. The lawsuit was filed against Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the Bureau of Indian Education. A spokesperson for the Interior declined to comment on pending litigation. In 2022, the U.S. Department of the Interior, under the direction of Secretary Deb Haaland, the first Native American to run the agency, released a scathing report on the legacy of the boarding school era, in which Native children were stolen from their homes, forced to assimilate, and in many cases physically, sexually and mentally abused. Countless children died at the schools, many of whom were buried in unmarked graves at the institutions. That report detailed the U.S. government's intentions of using the boarding schools as a way to both strip Native children of their culture and dispossess their tribal nations of land. The tribes are asking the court to make the U.S. account for the estimated $23.3 billion it appropriated for the boarding school program, detail how that money was invested, and list the remaining funds that were taken by U.S. and allocated for the education of Native children. Last year, President Joe Biden issued a formal apology for the government's boarding school policy, calling it 'a sin on our soul' and 'one of the most horrific chapters' in American history. But in April, the administration of President Donald Trump cut $1.6 million from projects meant to capture and digitize stories of boarding school survivors.
The National
22-05-2025
- Business
- The National
UK boarding schools hit by drop in number of international pupils
UK boarding schools have faced a drop in the number of international pupils enrolling at the institutions since the Covid-19 pandemic, a report found, as experts warn visa restrictions and higher fees could exacerbate that trend. The number of overseas pupils attending the schools has dropped by almost 14 per cent since 2020, when stricter visa requirements were introduced. In January, 25,500 non-British pupils with parents living overseas attended private schools, down from nearly 29,500 in 2020, according to the Independent Schools Council's annual census, released on Tuesday. Boarding schools faced a 2.6 per cent drop in pupils in the year to January, amounting to £29 million ($38.7 million) in lost fees. More than nine in 10 overseas pupils whose parents do not reside in the UK will board and, of those, 54 per cent are at an independent sixth form. The largest decrease in applications came from Spain, Nigeria, Russia, Thailand and Hong Kong. For new pupils from the Middle East, there was a drop of 11 per cent of pupils at boarding and day schools whose parents do not live in the UK, between 2024 and 2025. By contrast, there was a 10 per cent rise in pupils from the region whose parents also reside in the UK. The vast majority of those pupils will go to a day independent school. Ministers estimated they could raise £1.8 billion a year by the end of this parliament by introducing VAT to private schools, funds that would be spent on state schools. The results show a decline in pupil numbers that began before the introduction of VAT on fee-paying schools was announced last year. While boarding schools appeared to be recovering from the slump by 2023, numbers began dropping again in the 2024 and 2025 censuses. Experts say the UK is being perceived as increasingly unwelcoming to foreign students. Home Office statistics show student visas for independent schools declined by 4.7 per cent from 2023 to 2024. Last month, the fees for child student visas and child sponsor licences rose by 7 per cent. Increased visa application fees and the sizeable immigration health surcharge introduced under the previous Conservative government, as well as stricter requirements for the UK's child student visa for guardians and sponsor schools, are some of the policies blamed for driving new applicants away. The UK government proposed a new round of restrictions to university student visas last week, which includes a higher overseas student tax and shortens the time they can spend in the UK to look for a job after they graduate. The Boarding Schools' Association said the new policies could have a 'knock-on effect on boarding schools, which act as a pipeline for top UK universities' and risk 'threatening the UK's long-standing reputation as a welcoming and world-class education destination'. David Walker, executive director of the association, said UK boarding schools had an enduring appeal, including in the Middle East. "While logistical requirements have evolved, the fundamental appeal of a UK boarding education remains as compelling as ever," he told The National. He also blamed the introduction of VAT in January for the recent decline, just as schools were beginning to recover their losses from the pandemic. Imposing a levy on international students would damage the UK's reputation for welcoming the best and brightest students, he said. 'International students are a vital part of BSA school communities and it would be a shame to see that change," he told The Times. The census showed the biggest fall in the number of new pupils on record – 5.3 per cent on a like-for-like basis. Overall, the like-for-like number of pupils within ISC schools decreased by 2.4 per cent, or 13,363 children and young people. This is more than 10,000 more than the government estimated would leave this academic year. Schools have kept baseline fee increases to a minimum, with an average increase of 1.8 per cent from 2024 to 2025. For parents, the rise was 22 per cent once VAT was factored in. They have also awarded record numbers of bursaries, the data revealed, with the amount of fee assistance rising by 11.5 per cent from the previous year to £1.5 billion. Almost three quarters of those fees (£1.1 billion) were paid for by the schools themselves. Independent schools were also more active in their local communities, growing their partnership work with state schools. Julie Robinson, chief executive of the ISC, said the rise in bursaries showed schools were committed to improving education "even as political decisions affect their work". "However, given the decline in pupil numbers and the associated fall in revenue, it is unclear whether the past few years of rises in fee assistance will be sustainable in the future," she said. "We urge the government to work with us to ensure independent education remains an option for as many families as possible over the coming years.'
