Fort Lewis College (FLC) is a public liberal arts college in Durango, Colorado, and the only four-year and graduate studies institution in the Four Corners region. FLC's historical evolution spans its origins as a U.S. military fort, an Indian boarding school, and eventually a public college.

In accordance with a 1911 mandate, Fort Lewis College provides tuition-free education to qualified Native American Tribal and Alaska Native Village members. The college serves a diverse community comprising 37% Native American/Alaska Native learners, representing 166 Native American Tribes and Alaska Native Villages, 43% first-generation students, 42% Pell Grant recipients, and 15% Hispanic/Latinx students.

In 2008, the U.S. Department of Education designated FLC as a Native American-Serving, Non-Tribal Institutions (NASNTI). FLC is also recognized as a First Generation-Serving Institution by the State of Colorado and an emerging Hispanic-Serving Institution (HSI).

The first Fort Lewis army post was constructed in Pagosa Springs, Colorado, in 1878, and was relocated in 1880 to Hesperus, Colorado, on the southern slopes of the La Plata Mountains. In 1891, Fort Lewis was decommissioned and converted into a federal, off-reservation Indian boarding school.

In 1911, the fort's property and buildings in Hesperus were transferred to the state of Colorado to establish an "agricultural and mechanic arts high school." That deed came with two conditions: that the land would be used for an educational institution, and "to be maintained as an institution of learning to which Indian students will be admitted free of tuition and on an equality with white students" in perpetuity. Both conditions have been the missions and guides for the Fort Lewis school's various incarnations over the past century.

The Fort Lewis high school expanded into a two-year college in the 1930s, and in 1948 it became Fort Lewis A&M College, under the State Board of Agriculture's control. The "Aggies" studying at the Fort Lewis Branch of the Colorado State College of Agriculture and Mechanics could take courses in agriculture, forestry, engineering, veterinary science, and home economics.

Fort Lewis College began another period of growth and changes in 1956, when the college moved from its longtime home in Hesperus to its present location, 18 miles (29 km) east, atop what was then known as Reservoir Hill, overlooking Durango. Here, FLC became a four-year institution, awarding its first baccalaureate degrees in 1964.

Also in 1964, the college dropped the "A&M" moniker, changed its mascot from the Aggies to the Raiders, and changed the school's colors from the green and yellow of the Colorado State University system it had been affiliated with to blue and gold. In 1994, the college's mascot became the Skyhawks. In 1995, FLC joined the Council of Public Liberal Arts Colleges, and in 2002, it became independent of the Colorado State University system and formed its own governing Board of Trustees.