The final, in some ways ironic, phase of the residential school story unfolded against this backdrop of increasing Native political organisation and erupting Aboriginal anger. It was clear, for example, during talks between Indian Affairs officials and the leadership of the remaining residential schools and new hostels in the spring of 1968 that Ottawa had no plans other than the phasing out of these schools. When asked directly what the department's response would be to a request by Indian groups to operate their own schools, the DIA spokesmen waffled, simultaneously insisting on the inevitability of the integration policy and saying that Indian Affairs would respect the wishes groups that opposed integration.

      Several communities, particularly on the prairies, did, indeed, oppose the total elimination of the residential schools that served them. All in all, some seven institutions in Alberta and Saskatchewan survived the phasing out of the residential school system in the name of integration. All but one of the survivors henceforth would be operated by Native organisations.

       The twin processes of integration and retention that Indian Affairs and Native communities were promoting in the late 1960s culminated in the emergence of a new policy of Aboriginal control of the education of Native children. As part of the strong reaction against the White Paper of 1969, the National Indian Brotherhood (NIB) became more assertive about the need for Aboriginal people to acquire control over a number of fields that affected them deeply. The first of these in which a success was scored by the NIB was education. Under the banner 'Indian Control of Indian Education,' the NIB pushed hard for administrative control of this area. Finally, in 1973, the federal government gave in and agreed, where Native communities so desired, to shift control over the schools in which Native children were educated to Aboriginal bodies. And it has been under the rubric of that decision that Indian-controlled residential schools have continued in such centres as Saint Paul, Duck Lake, and Prince Albert. In other locations, such as the Kamloops school, what was formerly a denominational residential school now operates as an Aboriginal educational and cultural centre. In still others, such as Beauval, Saskatchewan, the former school has become a residence and vocational training centre for local Native populations.

      In the most exceptional case, the former Shingwauk Home in Sault Ste Marie now serves as the core building of Algoma University College, a unit in the post-secondary educational system of Ontario. Local Ojibwa groups have been pressing for it to be renamed Shingwauk University and transferred to Native administration. If or when that happens, the vision that The Pine, Chief Shingwauk, had when he made his way laboriously to Toronto will finally have become reality. In some ways, the residential school story has not so much come to a conclusion as started a new chapter.