Food and Nutrition

Food was inadequate and insufficient in Residential Schools. The diet at the schools was intentionally based on colonial foods and not Indigenous foods. Residential Schools stripped children of their Indigenous dietary practices and replaced them with unhealthy, starch-heavy alternatives. 

Nutritional studies and experiments were performed in at least six Residential Schools in the 1940s and 1950s. Malnourished children were denied food to act as control and treatment groups in experiments. One of the most consistent themes in testimony provided to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada was the experience of hunger at Residential Schools. 

Jackie Fletcher, a Shingwauk Survivor, recalls “I had the job of serving in the staff dining room and noticed the distinct difference in what we ate in comparison to what they ate and how the silverware, tableware and furniture were so very grand compared to our eating place. The food smelled so good and looked so appealing. Sometimes during the cleanup, I would sneak a pork chop in my apron pocket. I loved pork chops.”