BUCYRUS—On Thursday evening, the Bucyrus board of education held their monthly meeting where the mascot issue was discussed.
To begin the meeting, several Bucyrus community members and alumni addressed the board on their stance on whether or not the mascot should be changed.
Mary Myers, a Bucyrus alumna, was the first to speak in favor of changing the mascot. “I understand that change is difficult, but change is going to happen and we can either get out in front of the change, or we can lag behind because change is going to happen and it is just a matter of when. I think this is a fantastic opportunity for Bucyrus and BCS for all the students in the classrooms to choose a new mascot. We all recognize—you know we’ve got Cleveland and Washington and Bellevue—change is coming,” Myers said. “Things are changing—it’s a new world, you know fifty years ago our town was different, our ideas were different, but we have to recognize that there is racism in the world, there is sexism in the world, and unfortunately when you say ‘Redmen’, you have both of those categories right there.”
Myers ended her speech with, “We came to this country and we made our way here, and I think one way we can show respect for the Native Americans is to respect their asking us to change our mascot and I think we can respect that. None of us are Native American, we don’t know how it feels, we’re not going to pretend to know how it feels, but just merely respecting and recognizing that change is going to come—let’s get out in front of it.
The next to speak was Phil Joseph who was in favor of keeping the mascot. “I am against changing the name for several reasons, it would wipe out half my wardrobe and I can’t afford to pay for new clothes,” Joseph joked.
“On a more serious side of it, the cost of changing a name and a mascot, I think it would be over 150,000 dollars—you’ve got the banners in the gym that have the mascot on them, a wall in the gym with the mascot on it, softball fields, football fields, the baseball diamond, the chairs the players sit on during games. I think if you have the money to change all that, we could use the money for better things like the weight room—all of our students use the weight room and it’s a classroom for some students because they take phys. ed. in there.
Instead of spending money on the mascot, I’d like to fix up something that all students can use. I’ve talked to a lot of people and none of them thought the mascot was an insult, most of them thought it was a sign of strength and pride in our school district,” Joseph said.
The other individual to speak on the matter was Cody Ellis, a 2009 BCS graduate. “One thing when I go back and look, one thing when I remember and what I am so proud of of Bucyrus when I was there and how I grew up has nothing to do with the mascot, a lot of it has to do with the achievements, the people I met, the classmates I had, the education that I had, and the extracurricular activities that Bucyrus afforded us at the time,” Ellis began. “I think a lot of people here in the community are talking about this ‘Redmen’ tradition that we’ve had for so long and that changing this mascot is going to destroy this tradition. A part of me questions what tradition we had because in the past ten years, our graduation rate has not been above 90%, we’ve had more teacher vacancies in the past couple years than we have ever had in our history, our district has not passed a levy since 2011 although our levy is renewable each year, and currently based on our five-year forecast, our district will be operating in the red for the coming years if that is correct. I guess I am confused with the community and the outpouring of support for this tradition—what tradition are we supporting because currently there will not be a tradition whether we have a mascot or not.”
Ellis went on to talk about how this is an opportunity to be leaders and set the district apart from others and reminded those who were listening that the school isn’t just educating people that will stay in and change Bucyrus, but educating those who will go out and change the world.
Keith Naufzinger was the last to address the board on the matter, and echoed many of Mr. Joseph’s thoughts, but had some words of his own to say. “Today it just seems like everybody is offended about something, so I mean what are they going to do? You have 20 counties out of 88 that are either named after Indians or have something to do with Indians, whether it’s word phrases—are they going to start changing county names? City names? River names? Battlefields during the Civil War? I just hate that we are destroying our history, and as teachers, you guys don’t understand it—whether it’s good or bad, we still have to teach our children in school the history.”
John Kime, a board member, gave his opinion on the matter towards the end of the meeting. “It is very clear that we all have different opinions and that’s okay. Today I did speak with Sherri Clemons, the Director of Tribal Heritage for the Wyandotte Tribe, who if you are familiar with the local history, that is the local tribe that occupied these lands back in the 1700 and 1800s. So, I obviously contacted her about our mascot and their stance, and she did say that their tribe has expressed support for the term “chief” in the past,” Kime said. “I told her what our mascot was, and her words to me were, ‘there are so many other names that you guys could choose.’ they view that term as a slur, and that was their stance. Not for a second throughout this whole process have I ever thought we used the term ‘Redmen’ as an insult or a slur, I never thought there was malicious intent from our community, but how it is perceived by people of the Wyandotte tribe, and I can’t in good faith ignore that because their voice has to matter, too.”
Kime stated that when this discussion began back in July, he was in favor of keeping the mascot the same, but after research, he doesn’t feel it is the right choice anymore.
Fellow board member, Deb Hoover, echoed his thoughts, stating, “I am the third of five generations in this district, I was a cheerleader all through school, and I was always very proud of the name ‘Redmen’ and it has meant a lot to me. But like some others have said, times are changing, and if we don’t change it now, we are kicking it down the road. I can no longer say, ‘hey, I didn’t mean that I don’t know because I do know now,” Hoover began. “When the lady came to speak to the board, she said for them, that is the n-word. We wouldn’t call ourselves the ‘Blackmen.’ If it is taken that way, it doesn’t really matter the intent, and I can no longer just ignore the fact that the receiving end, they have now informed us that for them, it is an insult.”
A survey on the matter was sent out to the community, and of the 1718 people surveyed, 79.51 percent voted to keep the mascot and logo. To see the full breakdown of the survey, click this link and scroll down to section 10.2.
The last to address the matter was board member Randy Blankenship. “My takeaway from this whole process and the survey is that our community is not ready for this change—80% of our community, which is current taxpayers, alumni, students, parents of students, whoever that may be, eight out of the ten don’t want to change yet. When I ran for school board, and since I’ve been on the school board, which is a little over a year, I look at myself as a representative of the community. I am not here for my personal beliefs, I’m here to represent every person that is in this room and everybody else that is from BCS.”
Blankenship went on to make the motion that the board of education recognize the ‘Redmen’ name as the official mascot of BCS and to sanction the use of board-approved logos of Native American imagery.
The motion was seconded by Christa Graves and was passed on a 4-2 vote, with Deb Hoover and John Kime voting to turn it down.
Blankenship also said, “I’ve seen more passion for BCS in the last 2+ weeks than I’ve probably ever seen in my lifetime. So, we need to harness that moving forward when this mascot discussion is overcoming to a football game, a basketball game, an awards banquet for NHS, whatever that may be, we need you for that as well, not just the mascot discussion.
In other board business, it was stated that graduation is still on the same date as of right now, but the time may be changed to 7:30 or 8 p.m. due to track & field district finals that will be held at Colonel Crawford High School. The school will communicate any potential changes in date or time once more information is known.