Homeland - The Salamanca City Central School District acknowledges the homeland of the Onöndowa’ga:’ – the People of the Great Hill – the Seneca People on whose ancestral and modern day land Salamanca School District now stands and whose water we enjoy.  This truth is told by the words spoken with the George Washington Belt and the Two Row Wampum and codified by the 1794 Canandaigua treaty.  The 1794 treaty was signed by Timothy Pickering as a representative for George Washington and ratified by the U.S. Senate as the supreme law of the land. 

Boarding Schools -We are mindful of our geographical proximity to Thomas Indian School a boarding school for Native American children operated on the Cattaraugus Reservation of the Seneca Nation in Irving, New York from 1855 to 1957. We also acknowledge that Seneca children were also removed from their homes and sent to Tunesassa Indian Boarding School in Quaker, NY, and Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Carlisle, PA which were boarding schools off territory. These boarding schools implemented the federal Indian policy of forced assimilation which included the prohibition and punishment for using Seneca language and for Seneca cultural expression.  We recognize that this century-long trauma and cultural genocide continues to reverberate within the Seneca and other Hodinöhšyonih communities. We send love and acknowledgment to the survivors that reside in our community today.

Kinzua - We acknowledge that 1/3 of this territory was flooded by the construction of Kinzua dam despite and in opposition to the 1794 Canandaigua treaty.  We recognize this forcibly removed Seneca families from their homes and pushed them into Salamanca City Central School District. We offer care and support for their children and grandchildren.

Lease - We acknowledge we are standing on the Seneca territory of Ohi:yo’, in an area called Onё’dagö:h, meaning “place of the hemlocks.”  Further, we acknowledge that this city and school district exist through the good will of the Seneca Nation and was reaffirmed by the U.S. Congressional Acts of February 19, 1875, and September 30, 1890 that authorized the “Seneca Nation of New York Indians to lease lands within the Cattaraugus and Allegany Reservations…”

Human Rights - Salamanca City Central School District endorses the United Nations Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and strive to surpass each of the articles.  We wish to strongly state our commitment to teaching the history, culture, and language of the Onöndowa’ga:’(and beyond) in a framework that acknowledges settler colonialism and its consequences; to educating all of our students to understand the foundational nature and ongoing existence of settler colonialism as a social-political formation and system of thought. Mindful of these histories, we work toward understanding, acknowledgement, and ultimately reconciliation.

Diversity - The Salamanca City Central School District acknowledges and greatly values the diverse community members from indigenous nations, their spiritual and physical relationship to this environment, their rights, their resilience, their sovereignty, and their heritage.

Other tribes - We also acknowledge other members of the Hodinöhšyonih Confederacy including the Tuscarora, Oneida, Cayuga, Onondaga, and Mohawk that have a connection and presence here.

Conclusion - We stand with all indigenous peoples in their resolve to remain connected to their land.  While we cannot undo what has been done, it is the goal of the Salamanca City Central School District to make improvements that will benefit the next seven generations of indigenous students.