The program's goal was to "introduce Native Americans to mainstream values and social roles without demanding the abandonment of the old for the new.
Many of the students and families praised the program; others criticized it and the LDS Church for weakening the Native Americans' ties to their own cultures.
In 2016 through 2018, ten plaintiffs filed suit in the Navajo Nation Tribal Court, alleging they had been sexually abused while in the foster program, and the LDS Church did not adequately protect them.
Leader Brigham Young advocated buying children held by Native Americans and Mexican traders as slaves (a legal practice in the Utah Territory prior to the American Civil War), freeing them from slavery, and encouraged Latter-day Saints to educate and acculturate the children as if they were their own.
"[8] In the Book of Mormon narrative, the Lamanites ultimately became the more righteous of the two groups as the Nephites fell into apostasy and were destroyed.
[9] The Book of Mormon insists that the Lamanites would survive the destruction of the Nephites and would, in turn, be "brought unto salvation",[10] and be "[restored] again to the knowledge of the truth".
As a result, Golden Buchanan and Miles Jensen organized an informal placement program under the direction of Spencer W. Kimball, who was raised in southeastern Arizona,[12] was the chairman of the church's Committee on Indian Relationships.
These arrangements continued, and by 1954 there were some 68 Native American students (mostly from the Navajo Nation) placed into foster homes in four different western states.
The Lamanite identity defined Indians as culturally and spiritually apostate Israelites destined for latter-day restoration through an internalized Protestant work ethic.
Buses and other transportation were arranged to bring children to the center where they would be fed, receive medical examinations, and be introduced to their foster families.
As a result, caseworkers rather than missionaries were given the responsibility of making the final decision for acceptance of students into the Indian Placement Program.
Foster parents were recommended by local bishops and were expected to provide free room, board, and clothing for the Native American children.
[15] "The day of the Lamanites is nigh", Kimball said, claiming that Navajo placement students were "as light as Anglos" and, in one case, several shades lighter than parents "on the same reservation, in the same hogan, subject to the same sun and wind and weather.
[13] At least three studies of the outcomes of the IPP, published in 1977, 1997, and 2025, have reported mostly positive results, and relied primarily on interviews of Native Americans involved.
The 1997 study gathered the oral histories of twenty-three participants from the Navajo Reservation in order to better understand the effects of the IPP.
Studies found that the "longer students remained in the program, the more likely they were to be employed and to earn high incomes" and also to marry.
[20] Three main themes emerged: positive and negative experiences with education, the LDS baptism requirement, and relationships within foster families.
Not many studies of the outcomes of the IPP have been conducted by Native Americans, but at least one survey of the program was published in Indian Country Today News.
The history follows Holiday's situation on the reservation, her years in Los Angeles in the IPP with her 1972 high school graduation at age 18, and her entrance to BYU.
[22]: 194–195 Critics "view intervention as an intrusion on the right to be fully Native American, a weakening of cultural pluralism, and a cause of psychological damage.