Dr. Samuel Torres (he/him) is the Deputy Chief Executive Officer for the National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition and has been a fundamental part of the team since 2019. Dr. Torres first joined NABS as the Director of Research and Programs where his contributions have included leading research teams through several projects such as the Indian Child Removal Study with the First Nations Repatriation Institute and the University of Minnesota, as well as the development of Indian boarding school research and coordinating with the US Department of the Interior’s Federal Indian Boarding School Initiative.

Samuel has a doctorate in Educational Leadership for Social Justice from Loyola Marymount University and his work encompasses the impacts of colonization on historical and contemporary education methods, particularly the legacy of boarding schools. With his extensive experience as a researcher, writer, educator, and leader, Dr. Torres holds a deep passion for decolonizing fixed knowledge systems, centering ancestral knowledge and histories, and working in community to promote Indigenous futures. A bicultural human being, Samuel Torres is Mexica/Nahua on his father's side, and Irish/Scottish from his mother. In addition to actively learning and practicing Nahua language, traditions, and ceremony, he belongs to the Mexica kinship community, Kalpulli Yaocenoxtli, in St. Paul, Minnesota. Dr. Torres serves on the Board of Directors for Indigenous Roots Cultural Arts Center (St. Paul, MN) and the Educator's Institute for Human Rights (Washington, DC).