Last week the Green Mountain Unified School Board took on the controversial topic of school mascots and political correctness.

On April 11, the board held a public hearing over the name “Chieftain,” the school branding for Green Mountain High. Several organizations and individuals voiced opposition to the continued use of the name, claiming it was racist and violates a school policy adopted earlier in the year.

Act 152

Last year, state lawmakers passed Act 152, which relates to “non-discriminatory school branding.” The new law requires that school mascots don’t directly or indirectly reference or stereotype “the likeness, features, symbols, traditions, or other characteristics that are specific to either: (A) the race, creed, color, national origin, sexual orientation, or gender identity of any person or group of persons.”

Sen. Dick McCormack, D-Windsor

The bill’s primary sponsor was state Sen. Dick McCormack, D-Windsor.

Under the new law, individuals may file a complaint, which begins a review process that eventually is sent to Vermont’s secretary of education. Groups voicing opposition to the Green Mountain High brand name include the NAACP, Gedakina, and the Education Justice Coalition in Burlington. The board received six complaints and has about a month to respond.

Local resident Matt Gorsky attended the hearing and spoke out against using the mascot. He said the mascot goes against Act 152 as well as the school’s vision statement.

“Teach empathy, compassion, responsibility, and respect, and aspire to be citizens of a diverse democracy, and a changing world,” Gorsky said. “Since 1968 the National Congress of Native Americans has had a program in place to work against the use of indigenous imagery in the use of mascots and logos.”

“It’s taken over 50 years for Vermont to move in concert with that effort, and now a small town who thinks there’s no harm in it, is standing in the way of progress,” he added.

Another resident, Randy Miles, spoke in favor of keeping the mascot as is. He cited the Oxford language dictionary definition for the word ‘chieftain.’

“The word has no direct claim to any race, group, or people,” he said. “It was a meaningful word used by many races along the way from the early 1800s. … The name chieftain does not belong to Native Americans, it belongs to everyone.”

According to the Oxford Dictionary, a chieftain is “the leader of a people or a clan” or in a less formal context it means “a powerful member of an organization.”

Miles noted that it was the students of the school who chose the name for their sports teams in 1971.

Critics of the mascot pointed out that the school had previously been using Native American imagery along with the name and therefore has created confusion by continuing to use the Chieftain brand name.

Emily Burkland, another resident to speak at the hearing, also opposes the mascot. She read from a letter she submitted to the board.

“It serves to divide and it creates an unsafe atmosphere that isn’t conducive to learning for all,” she said. “Keeping the name, changing the image, does nothing to erase the historical symbolism of the chieftain that is preserved on social media and in alumni communities.

The entire April 11 meeting of the Green Mountain Unified School Board can be viewed online here.

Michael Bielawski is a reporter for True North. Send him news tips at bielawski82@yahoo.com and follow him on Twitter @TrueNorthMikeB.