At Thursday’s meeting of the University of Michigan’s Board of Regents, members of the Saginaw Chippewa Indian Tribe of Michigan asked the University to return hundreds of sets of human remains and relics they say belong to their ancestors.

Shannon Martin, director of the tribe’s Ziibiwing Center of Anishinable Culture and Lifeways, said the University holds 1,428 pieces of ancestral remains and other tribal objects in cardboard boxes on the shelves of University storage facilities.

The tribe submitted a request to the University in November for the return of the remains. In January it was denied. The tribe doesn’t intend to drop the matter, though.

University officials say they’re keeping the bodies for research purposes, but the tribe contends that they should be returned so the tribe can bury them.