Reply to WaPo Endorsement for FCPS School Board

Forum Index » Fairfax County Public Schools (FCPS)

Reply to "WaPo Endorsement for FCPS School Board "

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote]Keys-Gamarra has been fairly consistent that she wants to see private funding for any school renamings. Grisafe has regurgitated the R-party line that the renaming process has torn the Stuart community apart, without ever acknowledging that Confederate names cause pain within our communities. Seriously, white people who claim that Confederate names and imagery have "little or no impact' on education or on others need to look around. I also think that "eliminating bullying' as an aspirational goal is a good idea, and there are ways to further that goal.

As for budgets, Keys-Gamarra wants to protect them; Grisafe wants to cut them. Everyone with any knowledge of FCPS knows that the programs that one person wants to terminate may well be those that are nearest and dearest to others. Keys-Gamarra has the endorsements of the Fairfax County Education Association and the Fairfax County Federation of Teachers. Grisafe has the endorsement of Elizabeth Schultz and Resistance Media.[/quote]

[quote]Keys-Gamarra has been fairly consistent that she wants to see private funding for any school renamings. [/quote]

We'd all like to see private funding for a lot of things--doesn't mean it is going to happen.

[quote]Grisafe has regurgitated the R-party line that the renaming process has torn the Stuart community apart, without ever acknowledging that Confederate names cause pain within our communities[/quote]

Republicans are not the only ones who feel that way.  And, the way the School Board handled this did tear the community apart.  That was pretty obvious if you watched the Citizen Participation and listened to people.  
What makes me the saddest is that they demonized educators--long dead-- who named the schools.  There was no evidence at all that it was done out of spite.  If you read the minutes of the decision making, the schools were named after famous Americans because there was conflict over the geographic names at the time.  Specifically, Lee was supposed to be Franconia HIgh and Springfield people objected.  So, they passed a rule to name them after famous Americans.  In fact, Vienna wanted Madison to be named Vienna High and they named it Madison because of the policy.  Then, they named 'Munson Hill High" after Jeb Stuart because he had an encampment there.
All of this is in the minutes.
But, people like McElveen had to demonize those people.  Even Moon acknowledged that it was not right to do that.

Do you know that the children of some of those men still live in Fairfax County?  They are disgusted with the way their family members were labeled.  Talk about bullying.

I am sorry if it causes some kids "pain".  It's kind of sad that something like that causes pain--that the kids have not learned that it has no impact on them today.  Someone has failed here.  
Would I name a school Jeb Stuart today?  NO.  But, I do understand how Southerners revered their ancestors--and the reverence had nothing to do with white supremacy.

[quote]eliminate bullying[/quote] sounds good--I cannot imagine there is not one person who wants bullying in the schools--but there are plenty of policies already addressing that.  I think you already know this.

[/quote]

So, in the wake of the Brown v. Board of Education decision, the 1958 School Board changed the name of three schools planned as Franconia HS, Munson Hill HS, and Vienna HS to Lee HS (Lee District was named after estate of Fitzhugh Lee, a Confederate), Stuart HS (clearly named after a Confederate general), and James Madison (a primary drafter of the Constitution, which the FCPS overseers in Richmond claimed allowed school segregation).  Sounds like kowtowing to me.

But, then, you have more empathy for the descendants of white men who opposed integration (remember, the 1950s FCPS School Board changed the name of the FCPS "Committee on Desegregation" to the "Segregation Committee" in the 1950s and then tried to delay full integration until the early 1970s, prompting a rebuke from the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals) than you do for students today who know that it takes more than scrubbing the Confederate flag off the floor of the JEB Stuart gym to make "JEB Stuart HS" an appropriate name for their school.  Small wonder Chris Grisafe is your man.   [/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics