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| 26 years ago the NEA began to address the Native team name/mascot problem as an educational issue, and they're still at it. Image source: American Indian Sports Team Mascots |
I had missed news that the National Education Association -- which I belong to through the state level MEA -- voted to urge schools to retire Native-themed mascots and team names. The Representative Assembly of the NEA passed a resolution in July, 2018 that reads:
The NEA RA directs NEA to support, in ways it finds appropriate and within the budget, the removal of “R-skins, Braves, Indians, and Warriors” mascots and the imagery associated with each from public schools.
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| Screenshot of elementary school teacher Marty Meeden, who is Paiute-Washoe, from this NEA video about his advocacy helping non-Native educators understand the effect their attitudes (and ignorance) have on Native students. |
As reported by Minneapolis television station KARE11 in the city where the NEA held its annual meeting last summer, Marty Meeden, a former chair of the NEA's American Indian/Alaska Native Caucus, noted that mascots are "demeaning to us as Native people" and explained why this is an educational issue:
...poor imagery has a whole lot to do with our success and failures as students and adults.
And to still allow those words to be said and perpetuated, it still keeps us not even as second-class citizens, but third or fourth-class citizens.
I appreciate Allison Dorko,Ph.D., a Skowhegan Area High School alumna who teaches mathematics at Oklahoma State University, sharing this info with me.
Dorko also submitted a letter to the school board in Skowhegan last week arguing that board member Jennifer Poirier should recuse herself from any votes on retiring the mascot.
Dorko argues that Poirier organizes the group Skowhegan "Indian Pride" which clearly indicates her bias.
SIP often posts racist memes and language about Native people, including rape threats aimed at Penobscot Tribal Ambassador Maulian Dana, a Native woman who has led the effort to retire the Indian mascot and team name.
Dorko sent her letter to the Waterville Morning Sentinel's opinion page also but, unless they print it today, I am going to scoop them when I publish her letter here tomorrow.
The school board is holding a public forum on Tuesday, January 8, at 6pm at the Skowhegan Area Middle School, and I know people coming from all over the state to call for retirement of the Indian team name.
Alumni who currently reside outside Maine will be present to call for its retirement as well. One may even be a former star of the field hockey team which won three in a row state championships. Stay tuned...
