Established in February 1880 as the Training School for Indian Youth, the Chemawa school for Indians is an off-reservation boarding school located in Oregon that serves tribes throughout the Pacific Northwest and Alaska. At the time of its founding in Forest Grove, Oregon, the school offered Indians the opportunity to earn an education and assimilate into mainstream society. Over time, however, its primary goal became providing training in vocational skills that would serve graduates both on and off the reservation.
———Fire destroyed most of the original school in 1885, which prompted a move to a new location at Chemawa, Oregon, and the renaming of the facility. Students took an active role in rebuilding and caring for the school, and by 1922 enrollment had climbed to over one thousand students. In 1927, Chemawa became a fully accredited four-year high school.
———Chemawa's focus has changed in the past century. It began as a coercive and authoritarian institution, became vocationally oriented to the early twentieth century, and later tried to incorporate native traditions into a general academic curriculum. Though initially unpopular with native students, Chemawa has survived various attempts by the Bureau of Indian Affairs to close it, thanks mainly to the support of Northwest tribes who have taken pride in the school's accomplishments and for whom it assumed an important role in the education of their children.

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