New York school district drops ‘disrespectful’ Redskins name

A school district in western New York has changed its team name from the Redskins to the Legends three months after board members decided to retire the 70-year-old name and all associated images, recognizing them as a "symbol of ethnic stereotyping" that could be "perceived as hurtful and disrespectful to others."

The Lancaster School Board unanimously approved the district’s new team name, logo and mascot during a board meeting on Monday night. Instead of the face of a Native American wearing a traditional headdress, the school’s new imagery consists of a knight in armor holding a sword.

The March decision to do away with Redskins insignia followed mounting pressure from local community members and rival schools, whose boycott of lacrosse matches over the name drew national attention. 

Though the term "redskin" has long been a source of controversy, the push to change team names gained momentum in 2013 after the Oneida Indian Nation in New York launched a campaign to pressure the NFL’s Washington Redskins franchise to change its name. While that campaign has yet to achieve its goals, it has inspired a range of similar initiatives across the country.

Joel Barkin, a spokesman for the Oneida Nation, applauded the school board's decision and said such outcomes can have wider implications. The more that names like Redskins are eliminated, he told Al Jazeera, “the more isolated the [NFL] team will continue to become.” 

Lancaster students voted for the Legends name and logo, which were submitted by eighth-grader Korissa Gozdziak, over other student submissions, including the Alphas, Dragons, Jaguars, Knights, Dragons and Pride. 

"I just want it to be something that the people can be proud of when they hear the name Lancaster Legend," she told reporters.

However, the change did not come without controversy. Some students and residents of Lancaster, about 15 miles east of Buffalo, opposed changing the decades-old team name, citing pride in community tradition.

Opponents also said they did not consider the name offensive to Native Americans and were dismayed that the decision was not put to a public vote.

"We wanted to be heard. If you gave us an opportunity to sit and make a decision as a group … we wouldn’t be here right now. We feel like we had no say in what happened to 68 years," said Brenda Christopher, a school board member who was not on the board when the March vote took place. 

A handful of opponents of the name change even stood up and turned their backs when Gozdziak was called in front of the school board to be honored for her winning submission. 

"I knew going into it that there’s no way you can please everyone in things like this," she told local ABC affiliate WKBW. "Whenever something’s changing, there’s always going to be people that don’t want it to change." 

Since the Oneida Indian Nation launched its campaign against the NFL’s Redskins franchise in 2013, other high school nickname controversies have come up.

In May the California State Assembly passed the California Racial Mascots Act, which prohibits all schools in the state from using Redskins as a nickname beginning in 2017. Four schools in the state currently do so, The Guardian reported.

Naming controversies have also not been limited to schools using Native American pejoratives and imagery. In September, Coachella Valley High School in California agreed to amend its team name from the Arabs to the Mighty Arabs and drop its grimacing mascot after Arab-American groups said it promoted negative stereotypes.