By the mid-19th century, European settlers viewed Aboriginal peoples as “the Indian problem”; an extremely racist phrase that puts understanding the goal of residential schools in its context. First Nations groups were seen as a problem for European settlers looking to acquire land. On a federal level, Duncan Campbell Scott, Deputy Superintendent of Indian Affairs reported in 1920, “I want to get rid of the Indian problem.” It was through this lens that the federal government, alongside churches, used the residential school system as a way to assimilate Aboriginal children into what they saw as civilized human beings. This sad, and rather simple explanation of many years of history, puts the Coqualeetza Residential school in a broader context of what was a nationwide process.