Indian Placement Program

The Indian Placement Program (IPP) or Indian Student Placement Program (ISPP), also called the Lamanite Placement Program, was operated by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) in the United States, officially operating from 1954 and virtually closed by 1996. It had its peak during the 1960s and 1970s. Native American students who were baptized members of the LDS Church were placed in foster homes of LDS members during the school year. They attended majority-white public schools, rather than the Indian boarding schools or local schools on the reservations. The program's goal was to "introduce Native Americans to mainstream values and social roles without demanding the abandonment of the old for the new." The foster placement was intended to help develop leadership among Native Americans and assimilate them into majority-American culture. The cost of care was borne by the foster parents, and financially stable families were selected by the church. Most of these placements took place on the Navajo Nation, with a peak participation of 5,000 students in 1972. The program decreased in size after the 1970s, due to criticism, changing mores among Native Americans, and restriction of the program to high school students as schools improved on reservations. Many of the students and families praised the program; others criticized it and the LDS Church for weakening the Native Americans' ties to their own cultures.

In 2016 through 2018, ten plaintiffs filed suit in the Navajo Nation Tribal Court, alleging they had been sexually abused while in the foster program, and the LDS Church did not adequately protect them.

LDS theology suggests that the Native Americans have a special status. It held that Book of Mormon people had two distinct phenotypes: Nephites, who initially "were a civil and a delightsome people;" and Lamanites, who were at times "wild, and ferocious, and a blood-thirsty people." In the Book of Mormon narrative, the Lamanites ultimately became the more righteous of the two groups as the Nephites fell into apostasy and were destroyed. The Book of Mormon insists that the Lamanites would survive the destruction of the Nephites and would, in turn, be "brought unto salvation", and be "[restored] again to the knowledge of the truth".

The Indian Student Placement Program (ISPP) of the mid-20th century developed from an informal placement in 1947 in Richfield, Utah, by the LDS Church. A 16-year-old Navajo teenager, Helen John, asked permission to stay in the city to go to school. As a result, Golden Buchanan and Miles Jensen organized an informal placement program under the direction of Spencer W. Kimball, who was raised in southeastern Arizona, was the chairman of the church's Committee on Indian Relationships. With her parents' permission, Helen was allowed to stay with the Buchanan family, whom she knew in Richfield. This arrangement was not an official program, but it was the basis for the Indian Placement Program that would later be established. The Buchanans agreed to take in other children as well,</blockquote>

Organization of the Indian Placement Program

The success of these students led to the church establishing a formal placement program in July 1954, under the Church Social Services,

In October 1960, Kimball discussed the program at the General Conference. He said that Natives who participated in the program were gradually turning lighter, becoming "white and delightsome". "The day of the Lamanites is nigh", Kimball said, claiming that Navajo placement students were "as light as Anglos" and, in one case, several shades lighter than parents "on the same reservation, in the same hogan, subject to the same sun and wind and weather." written by Arliene Nofchissey and Carnes Burson.

In 1972 local priesthood leaders were given the responsibility for recruiting and screening new students. Due to strong criticism and rising Native American activism, the program had nearly been discontinued in 1977. The US government commissioned a study under the Interstate Compact Secretariat, which oversaw educational efforts. It heard much praise from Native American families for the program.

Results

At least three studies of the outcomes of the IPP, published in 1977, 1997, and 2025, have reported mostly positive results, and relied primarily on interviews of Native Americans involved.

The 1997 study gathered the oral histories of twenty-three participants from the Navajo Reservation in order to better understand the effects of the IPP. All of the subjects were around 33 years old at the time of the study and were born on the Navajo reservation. The sample consisted of 22 interviewees. The group consisted of seven men and fifteen women. At any one time, this ratio indicated the Program's ratio. All of them had completed high school, ten had attended college, and four had received college diplomas. When the program began, all of the participants were of varying ages. Fourteen of the students were under the age of ten, eighteen were under the age of thirteen, and the remaining three were in their senior or junior year of high school. Fourteen percent had three or more foster families, 43 percent had a single foster family, and another 43 percent had two separate foster families. According to the study, the average length of time spent in the program was about seven years. The participants in the study all reported being members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

The results reported were predominantly success stories. As recorded, about one-third of the participants stayed in the program until graduation from high school. 40 percent of students decided to drop out of the program, and 15 percent of students left the program because of their parents' wishes or needs. Students who did drop out were still more likely to finish high school than were Native American peers who had not participated in the program. Students in the Indian Placement Program had an 82 percent graduation rate. Studies found that the "longer students remained in the program, the more likely they were to be employed and to earn high incomes" and also to marry. Three main themes emerged: positive and negative experiences with education, the LDS baptism requirement, and relationships within foster families.

Not many studies of the outcomes of the IPP have been conducted by Native Americans, but at least one survey of the program was published in Indian Country Today News.

Criticism

Beginning in the 1970s the Indian Placement Program was increasingly criticized. In 1977, the U.S. government commissioned a study to investigate accusations that the church was using its influence to push children into joining the program. The commission found that the program was largely positive, and enjoyed emphatic support both from Native American parents and white foster parents. Critics "view intervention as an intrusion on the right to be fully Native American, a weakening of cultural pluralism, and a cause of psychological damage." The church filed suit in federal district court in Salt Lake City, alleging that the Tribal Court did not have jurisdiction and seeking an injunction "to stay the proceedings from moving forward under tribal jurisdiction."

In total, ten plaintiffs filed suit between 2016 and 2018. After primarily disputing over tribal versus federal jurisdiction of the cases, rather than proceeding to trial, the cases of all but one of the plaintiffs were settled between the parties in 2018.

Indian Placement Program

Organization of the Indian Placement Program

Results

Criticism

See also

References

Further reading