Opinion Blog


Rick Hess Straight Up

Education policy maven Rick Hess of the American Enterprise Institute think tank offers straight talk on matters of policy, politics, research, and reform. Read more from this blog.

School & District Management Opinion

School Renaming Shouldn’t Be an Exercise in Ideology and Ignorance

By Rick Hess — March 15, 2021 3 min read
Image shows a multi-tailed arrow hitting the bullseye of a target.
  • Save to favorites
  • Print

Decisions regarding renamings and cancellations are typically made behind closed doors, making it hard to gauge how much deliberation goes into them (as with the recent, deservedly controversial decision to cease publishing six Dr. Seuss titles). In a bit of a twist, however, another such push has played out more publicly: the San Francisco school board’s move to strip existing names, including Abraham Lincoln and Dianne Feinstein, from 44 schools. Because that process (momentarily on hold) unfolded over Zoom, outsiders like my AEI colleague Greg Weiner were able to document the deliberations of the School Names Advisory Committee. The transparency was illuminating.

For starters, the committee’s criteria for renaming are remarkably elastic, including “anyone directly involved in the colonization of people,” individuals who “exploit workers/people,” and those “connected to human-rights or environmental abuses.” It’s hard to imagine a principled or apolitical way to decide who qualifies, even if the committee approached its work diligently. Alas, such diligence was not on display.

When the committee chair took up the Paul Revere K-8 school and asked whether Revere met the criteria for renaming, a member answered in the affirmative, declaring that Revere “stole Indigenous lands.” Weiner recounts, “The chair asks for evidence, since Revere was a silversmith best known for warning of the British invasion.” In response, the member allowed that “it’s more about the storyline” (because Revere apparently represents a narrative of American oppression).

The chair pointed out that the criteria for renaming require individual wrongdoing rather than “storylines.” In response, the member turned to the web and then enthused, “I just found something right now,” reporting having just discovered that Revere, as an artillery officer in the Penobscot Expedition, was “directly connected” to colonizing the Penobscot Nation. The member added, “I found it on history.com, which is pretty credible.” Umm. As Weiner points out, “The Penobscot Expedition was a naval armada sent by Massachusetts against the British in 1779. Fighting occurred around the Penobscot River. It had nothing to do with the Penobscot Nation. Whatever.”

This was far from the only instance of committee members permitting their enthusiasm to override attention to historical fact. When they came to Sanchez Elementary, for example, one member spoke up on why the name should be stripped: “Colonizer, California missions, blah blah blah.” The inanity would be funny under other circumstances. But as Weiner drolly notes, “They had the wrong Sanchez.”

In the case of Thomas Edison Charter Academy, it was suggested that the school met the renaming criteria because Edison supposedly “had a fondness for electrocuting animals,” including “Topsy, a well-loved circus elephant.” There was a problem in that Edison’s alleged electrocution didn’t obviously fit the criteria, although one committee member suggested that maybe Edison could be removed for “environmental abuses.” Set aside the make-it-up-as-you-go standard; Weiner observes that Edison actually had “nothing to do with Topsy’s electrocution.”

Now, I’m not reflexively opposed to renaming schools. As RJ Martin and I wrote last June, for instance, we should absolutely rename the 100-odd schools named after Confederate generals and leaders. We noted, “Not even a single child should have to attend a school named for those who took up arms against our nation in defense of slavery.” Of course, we also observed, “At the same time, assessing how and if long-gone leaders should be honored in society today requires judgment and principle. . . . But there’s a difference between making room for imperfection and going out of our way to honor those who fought against American values.”

Schools should not be renamed cavalierly, with murky criteria or fake facts. Renaming should be a deliberative process that models the kind of civic seriousness we want our students to master. When it turns into a heedless exercise in ideology and ignorance, as it has in San Francisco, we all lose.

The opinions expressed in Rick Hess Straight Up are strictly those of the author(s) and do not reflect the opinions or endorsement of Editorial Projects in Education, or any of its publications.

Events

This content is provided by our sponsor. It is not written by and does not necessarily reflect the views of Education Week's editorial staff.
Sponsor
Mathematics Webinar
Pave the Path to Excellence in Math
Empower your students' math journey with Sue O'Connell, author of “Math in Practice” and “Navigating Numeracy.”
Content provided by hand2mind
This content is provided by our sponsor. It is not written by and does not necessarily reflect the views of Education Week's editorial staff.
Sponsor
Recruitment & Retention Webinar
Combatting Teacher Shortages: Strategies for Classroom Balance and Learning Success
Learn from leaders in education as they share insights and strategies to support teachers and students.
Content provided by DreamBox Learning
Classroom Technology K-12 Essentials Forum Reading Instruction and AI: New Strategies for the Big Education Challenges of Our Time
Join the conversation as experts in the field explore these instructional pain points and offer game-changing guidance for K-12 leaders and educators.

EdWeek Top School Jobs

Teacher Jobs
Search over ten thousand teaching jobs nationwide — elementary, middle, high school and more.
View Jobs
Principal Jobs
Find hundreds of jobs for principals, assistant principals, and other school leadership roles.
View Jobs
Administrator Jobs
Over a thousand district-level jobs: superintendents, directors, more.
View Jobs
Support Staff Jobs
Search thousands of jobs, from paraprofessionals to counselors and more.
View Jobs

Read Next

School & District Management What's Stopping Later School Start Times That Support Teen Sleep? Bus Schedules, for One
See practical strategies for districts looking to move start times to accommodate teen sleep schedules.
5 min read
Crossing guard Pamela Lane waves at a school bus passing her intersection as she crosses students going to Bluford Elementary School on Sept. 5, 2023, in Philadelphia.
Crossing guard Pamela Lane waves at a school bus passing her intersection near Bluford Elementary School on Sept. 5, 2023, in Philadelphia.
Alejandro A. Alvarez/The Philadelphia Inquirer via AP
School & District Management Opinion 'I Used to Think School Systems Were Broken': Educators Reflect
Changing your mind or evolving your thinking is not easy. Hear how these education leaders did just that.
1 min read
Used to Think
Hear how these Harvard education graduate students evolved their thinking around both their practice and work as systems leaders.
School & District Management Opinion I Teach Educators How to Change Their Minds. Here’s How
Four important lessons for how educators—school and district leaders, especially—can create opportunities for growth.
Jennifer Perry Cheatham, Erica Lim & Carmen Williams
5 min read
Video stills
The students from the Leaders of Learning class taught by Jennifer Perry Cheatham at the Harvard Graduate School of Education last year.
Vanessa Solis/Education Week
School & District Management Opinion The 4 Gifts Principals Should Give Teachers This Year (Hint: Not Another School Mug)
Instead of a staff pizza party or a school-branded mug, give them meaningful gifts that really nourish their craft.
4 min read
A Large yellow bow across the foreground of a  photo illustration group of teachers line up happily closely together along a wall
Vanessa Solis/Education Week via Canva