Today, September 11, the U.S. Army will begin its sixth disinterment project to reunite the remains of five Indigenous children who died more than a century ago with their descendant relatives and communities.

Guest Opinion. This year, on Sept. 6, after the Labor Day holiday, tribal leaders will travel to the State Capitol to address the legislature about the recent audit of the California State University system’s failure to repatriate nearly 700,000 Native American human remains and artifacts. These remains remainsare stored in boxes on shelves.

California tribal leaders and members of a California Assembly Select Committee on Native American Affairs displayed their ire on Tuesday with California State University (CSU) administrators for their disrespectful handling of Native American human remains and cultural items as revealed in a June audit.

The National Park Service (NPS) has announced a grant allocation of $3.4 million to benefit 16  American Indian Tribes and 28 museums. These grants are designed to provide support for activities related to consultation, documentation, and the repatriation of ancestral remains and cultural artifacts, all in accordance with the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA). This funding represents the most substantial appropriation for NAGPRA grants since the Act's enactment in 1990 and the inception of the funding program in 1994.

Five Native American children who died more than a century ago at an Indian boarding school in Pennsylvania will be going home to their closest living relatives this September, the United States Office of Army Cemeteries announced in a federal notice on Thursday.

A public university in California has begun the process of returning an unconfirmed number — thought to be around 213—of Native American human remains and burial objects to their respective tribal nations.

Native American ancestors buried in New York will soon be protected by state law from unintentional excavation—a right the state’s tribal nations have been advancing for more than 20 years.

WASHINGTON – A bipartisan group of 13 U.S. Senators is asking universities and museums with large collections of Native American human remains why they’ve failed to repatriate them to tribes—more than 30 years after a federal law was passed that compelled them to do so.  

The single-largest holder of Native American human remains—a federally-owned power company in Tennessee—is taking steps to complete the decades-long repatriation of more than 14,000 Native American ancestors who were unearthed in dam construction projects across the Tennessee valley from the 1930s through the 1970s.

Dartmouth College has unknowingly been using the bones belonging to Native American ancestors to teach with as recently as fall 2022, the college announced this week.

After 145 years, the Sisseton Wahpeton Oyate are done waiting.

Since last June, there have been more than 70 auctions—both international and domestic—selling potentially sensitive Native American cultural items. The Association on American Indian Affairs is educating buyers to avoid the corrupt and potentially poor investments into what is likely stolen Indigenous art and cultural belongings.

Harvard University has a reputation that precedes it: Founded in 1636, It’s one of the oldest institutes dedicated to higher learning in the United States, and ranked as the most prestigious university in the world.

Dean Lyons, an Oneida Nation Turtle Clan member, spoke to three of his ancestors during a transfer ceremony at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, on Feb. 21.

Eight years ago, the FBI made the largest seizure of stolen artifacts and Native American human remains in its history from an amateur archaeologist in Indiana. Now, with the majority of ancestors and artifacts returned to their respective nations, tribal leaders and experts on the case say the bureau has created a model for timely yet thorough repatriation.

The University of Kansas (KU) is bringing on a repatriation program manager next month to facilitate the return of 380 ancestors and 554 burial objects university staff found on campus in September 2022.

Among Native communities, federal officials, and museum employees across the United States, The University of California at Berkeley has a longstanding reputation as the institution with the most Native American human remains and associated burial objects in its collection.

Your questions about Indian Boarding Schools, as answered by our team. 

**This story contains disturbing details from U.S. Indian Boarding Schools. For support and mental health resources, visit The Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition’s list of resources.**