Posted on 06/24/2005 5:27:50 PM PDT by againstallhope
Following dramatic remarks by a clearly conflicted Board President Nancy Riddle, the Berkeley Unified School District Board of Directors voted 3-2 Wednesday night to deny a petition to change the name of Jefferson Elementary School to Sequoia.
Her voice breaking up and visibly close to tears, Riddle told a hushed crowd that “I know that I will be disappointing some people who I care about, but I can’t support this.” Riddle’s succeeding no vote on the petition broke the 2-2 deadlock on the board that was known two weeks ago when the remaining board members publicly announced how they would vote on the issue.
(Excerpt) Read more at berkeleydailyplanet.com ...
Anybody have any thoughtful comments?
No thoughtful comments, just a bravo for those who had the courage and common sense to stop it.
She's starting to see the whole picture.
Over a simple matter like this? Does she have a coronary when has to choose her salad dressing at a restaurant?
If the school were named after George Washington....well, they would have done the same? They'd have to.
Read the whole article. It's really pretty ugly.
Maybe you can reduce the whole thing to the self hating left bashing away at every one of this country's institutions.
Do students at St. Monica's high school get to vote to change the school's name to St. Mary's? Do student's at P.S. No. 6 get to vote to change the name to P.S. No. 402? Giving children such power is counterproductive to education and could be giving them bizarre expectations. I can see it now: "Workers at Smeckendorf's Cafeteria have decided to change its name to Garibaldi Brothers' Grill, against protests from the Smeckendorf family."
The New York Sun reports that a move is afoot in Berkeley, Calif., to change the name of Jefferson Elementary School, because the third president owned slaves. A familiar enough story, but this one reaches whole new levels of complexity. The proposed new name for the school is Sequoia Elementary, "but even with that name, the school district cannot quite dodge the slavery connotations":
Some community members have pointed out that under Chief Sequoia's leadership in the early 19th century, the Cherokee nation owned more than 1,500 black slaves. A spokesman for the Berkeley Unified School District, Mark Coplan, acknowledged that Chief Sequoia "presumably owned slaves and was rather barbaric," but he emphasized that the proposed new name would honor the sequoia tree, not the Cherokee leader.
The school conducted a vote of parents, teachers and tykes on what new name to propose. "Sequoia narrowly beat out the second-place candidate, Ohlone, which would have honored a California tribe." But wait, aren't Indian names supposed to be offensive?
BTW, I liked this:"The decision rejected a district-authorized vote held during the last week in May that saw the name Sequoia beat out Jefferson among students, staff, and parents and guardians at the school."
Theres nothing like letting fourth graders make the decisions in society.
"Theres nothing like letting fourth graders make the decisions in society."
In the rest of the country, I'd agree. In Berkely? Geeze, compared to most of the over-eighteen-year-old crowd in Bezerkly fourth graders are responsible adults.
Listen, Againsty, and tell me what you think. I am against the name change, but do you think a school like that can keep a politically incorrect name forever? Will they still have that name in 30 years?
Things drift leftward and anti-God-ward. The demands of the homosexual movement of 20 years ago in New York and San Francisco were of 10 years ago in Kansas City and Pittsburgh, and now those are the demands of today in the whole country.
One happy exception to this rule is abortion. It is no more popular now than it was 20 years ago!
Berkeley, well that figures...
"Her voice breaking and visibly close to tears."
Riddle, or Voinovich, or Durbin?
All of the above.
Everybody owned slaves! (du de duh dah dah)
everybody owned slaves (du de duh dah dah)
slaves slaves slaves...
Probably not very thoughtful, but what Berkeley? I see the article is from the Berkeley Daily Planet. That would be fitting to Berkeley, CA as it deserves to be on its own planet...circling out there somewhere.
That such a "debate" could ensue (and be seriously entertained) only illustrates that no real education of the children has taken place only a form of political indoctrination. They aren't being taught to think for themselves, and obviously no real knowledge of who the founders really were, much less Jefferson - which is precisely the plan. Orwell would be impressed I'm sure.
One must assume the quality of education in this burg is the best it can be. Otherwise they would be focusing on education rather than on window dressing.
Hheheh, please...
There can be no serious discussion of anything relating to Kim
Jong Il, or Hans Blix... See this thread:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1429166/posts?page=21#21
And now YOU have me humming music from "Lease"...
The City of Berkeley is named after George Berkeley, an Irish Bishop. Oddly though, Chief Sequoia owned approximately 1,500 slaves...far more than Thomas Jefferson.
Your hunch is correct:
"Bishop George Berkeley bought 3-5 slaves during his brief stay in the New World between 1728 and 1731, to work on his Rhode Island plantation, Whitehall (14). When Berkeley returned to Europe in 1731, he donated the plantation to Yale."
(Rev Jackson, please pick up the $$green courtesy phone)
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