During Native American Heritage Month in November, the Eastern Pennsylvania Conference’s Committee on Native American Ministry (CONAM) celebrates its leader Sandi Cianciulli and two honors she received this fall.
Franklin & Marshall College, in Lancaster, Pa., honored Sandi Cianciulli, team leader of the Eastern Pennsylvania Conference’s Committee on Native American Ministry (CONAM), during a traditional “blanket ceremony” on National Truth and Reconciliation Day, also known as Orange Shirt Day, Sept. 30.
Draped in a decorative blanket before nearly a hundred attendees, Cianciulli (of Oglala Lakota ancestry) was recognized for her years-long quest to bring honor and restorative justice to Indigenous students of the former Carlisle (Pa.) Indian Industrial School.
The school, in operation from 1879 to 1918, was the prototype for 27 federal, off-reservation boarding schools managed by the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs. Indigenous children were taken from their families and tribal homes to the schools to be educated and forcibly assimilated into the dominant Euro-American culture by erasing their Native languages and cultures.
There were more than 300 schools located both on and off Native reservations. Many were co-managed by Christian missionaries, some representing predecessor denominations of The United Methodist Church. Most of the schools ceased operations by 1978, although growing awareness of harsh conditions in the early years led many to close beginning in the 1930s.
Cianciulli had ancestors among the nearly 8,000 children and young adults who attended the Carlisle School, a poignant history she shares when leading tours of the historical site. Many died there; and the remains of about 180 are still buried under small, white tombstones inside the front gates of what is now the Carlisle U.S. Army Barracks and War College.
The National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, or Orange Shirt Day, serves as a way to promote wider awareness and foster healing for the ongoing trauma inflicted by such schools on many Indigenous people. The occasion is marked in both the U.S. and Canada, where Indigenous children were taken to similar boarding schools to live and work, while being educated and acculturated.
During the September observance, as many wore orange t-shirts, Carlisle School descendants spoke of the boarding school’s history and impact on their lives. Small flags surrounded them, planted on the college’s Hartman Green lawn. Orange flags bore the names and tribal identities of students who worked for Lancaster area families as part of the Carlisle Indian School’s “Outing” program. White flags honored students who did not survive.
“With care and tenderness,” read Circle Legacy Center’s Facebook post about the event, “we honored the legacy of Indigenous children who endured, survived or perished at the Carlisle Indian Industrial School, as well as other boarding schools across Turtle Island” (an Indigenous peoples’ term for the Earth).
Faculty member Mary Ann Levine led the planning of the annual gathering to highlight Franklin & Marshall’s (F&M) groundbreaking Reckoning with Lancaster historical anthropology research and education project, funded by a Andrew Mellon Foundation grant.
It was described as a way to “commemorate the historic harms of the boarding school system and to honor children who lived and labored in Lancaster.” At least 170 Carlisle School students were sent to work in Lancaster’s homes, farms and businesses.
Following the guest speakers’ remarks, Dr. Levine and her team honored both Cianciulli and Eugene Black Crow (Oglala Lakota), a boarding school descendant, survivor and fellow storyteller, by enfolding them with ceremonial blankets.
Cianciulli’s connection to Carlisle became personal and emotional when she discovered her relatives’ names and photos in the school’s digitized records. Those records are accessible from the Carlisle Indian School Digital Resource Center at Dickinson College, an historically United Methodist-related institution.
“We look forward to sharing these stories far and wide so that Native communities both on and off reservations can begin to heal and rebuild their legacy,” she said in response to the recognition. “It is a lasting legacy that stays—not one we hide from, but rather one we can learn from.”
A tireless activist and advocate for Native American causes, Cianciulli helped lead efforts to preserve the memory of the Carlisle School. She worked with the Army War College there to honor Native American military veteran leaders and invite them to speak at the barracks’ annual Jim Thorpe Sports Days competitive athletics tournament. That tradition lasted for 10 years until 2025, when the U.S. War Department withdrew support for what it considered DEI (Diversity, Equity and Inclusion) initiatives.
Cianciulli and other members of Eastern PA’s CONAM contributed to the F&M College’s Reckoning with Lancaster project in November 2024 by engaging students, faculty and local residents in its Loss of Turtle Island historical presentation held on campus.
CONAM also celebrated in May the 10th anniversary of the Eastern PA Annual Conference’s 2016 Act of Repentance toward Healing Relationships with Indigenous Peoples.
Moreover, Cianciulli was honored in another blanket ceremony October 12 by Philadelphia’s Indigenous Peoples Day (IPD) Committee as an Indigenous Knowledge Keeper and for her part in the committee’s campaign to have the City Council legally designate IPD as a permanent city holiday.
Indigenous Peoples Day, celebrated at Shackamaxon (aka Penn Treaty Park) in Philadelphia, is an alternative to the national Columbus Day observance. It redirects attention to the Indigenous peoples Columbus encountered and soon subjugated after his 1492 arrival in the Americas.
A former president of the Carlisle Indian School Project, Cianciulli is also a board member of the Circle Legacy Center (CLC), a nonprofit organization dedicated to supporting and empowering Native Americans. CLC partners with CONAM and F&M College in its important education and advocacy work.
Verna Colliver is secretary and John Coleman is communications liaison of the Eastern Pennsylvania Conference’s Committee on Native American Ministry (CoNAM). The CoNAM’s educational and advocacy efforts and its support for Native peoples are funded by one-half of the Native American Ministries Sunday special offering received annually by Eastern PA Conference churches.