San Diego Unified’s Junipero Serra High School will now be called Canyon Hills High School after students successfully petitioned for the name change, saying that the name of the founder of California’s mission system is offensive to indigenous peoples whose ancestors were subjected to its doctrine.
On Tuesday night, the San Diego Unified School Board unanimously voted for the name change and to change the school’s mascot from a conquistador to a rattlesnake, or a “Rattler.”
Students who started the name and mascot change effort said it’s offensive and racist to have a conquistador as a mascot because it represents the Spanish colonization of the Americas, during which Spanish conquerors carried out a genocide of indigenous peoples, killing millions by disease and by force. Serra was the founder of California’s mission system, which assimilated indigenous people to Catholicism and Spanish culture and was a key strategy of Spanish colonization.
“The mascot and Serra himself are tied to the oppression of native peoples, and we shouldn’t be glorifying a mascot like the conquistador with all the violence,” said Charlotte Taila, a Canyon Hills High junior who started a petition last summer to change the mascot. “We shouldn’t be cheering for conquistadors when there’s nothing to be celebrated.”
Local indigenous leaders praised the name change and said it will bring “much-needed healing” to the Kumeyaay and other first peoples.
“This very important name change starts the process of telling the truth,” said Angela Elliott-Santos, chairwoman of the Kumeyaay Heritage Preservation Council and Manzanita band of the Kumeyaay Nation, during Tuesday night’s board meeting. “The change will provide for a more accurate and ethical view of history.”
In addition to changing the school’s name, Elliott-Santos said the Kumeyaay Nation looks forward to seeing an acknowledgement of Kumeyaay land on the school campus and working with the school to create an accurate curriculum about Kumeyaay culture and history.
Also on Tuesday, the board voted to name a future City Heights campus after the late Rev. George Walker Smith, a faith and civic leader who was the first African-American elected to office in San Diego as a school board member.
And the board voted unanimously to change the name of a joint community park at Pacific Beach Middle School from “Pacific Beach Joint-Use Field” to “Fannie and William Payne Joint-Use Field.”
William Payne, a graduate of Paris’ Sorbonne University, was the first Black teacher at Pacific Beach Middle and the second Black teacher in San Diego Unified. His wife, Fannie Payne, had a master’s degree from San Diego State University and was a public school teacher in San Diego. Both were active community members.
In 1945, more than 1,900 Pacific Beach residents petitioned for William Payne to be removed from Pacific Beach Middle because they didn’t think a Black teacher was needed there, considering that only two Black families owned property in Pacific Beach.
In the wake of the Black Lives Matter movement last summer, two Pacific Beach residents worked with two students at the middle school to change the name of the field to honor the Paynes.
“We understand that this is a symbolic action that does not directly undo the historical implications of racism and anti-Blackness in Pacific Beach,” said Pacific Beach Middle School student Juliniel Woods, who helped lead the effort to change the name, at Tuesday’s meeting. “They may not have received the praise they deserved in their lifetime but now, with your help, we can finally give them their rightful recognition and continue to uncover the history of San Diego.”
The Canyon Hills Rattlers
The high school has had the conquistador mascot and Serra’s name since it opened in 1976, said Principal Erica Renfree. Renfree said she has heard concerns from students and others, especially about the mascot, during the years she has been principal.
“I do believe it’s important because we have gotten feedback from the years … that certain communities don’t feel welcome here, and we want to make this a completely inclusive school of all race, gender, everything,” Renfree said.
The school will be renamed Canyon Hills, or Mat Kwatup KunKun, because it is located in the Tierrasanta and Murphy Canyon neighborhoods, which have a canyon landscape. Meanwhile, the neighborhood Tierrasanta is sometimes referred to as “The Island in the Hills.”
The new mascot — the Rattler, or ‘ewii tenwai — is sacred to the Kumeyaay, who frequently depict the animal on baskets, Elliott-Santos said.
The name change had support from the San Diego-based Kanap Kuahan Coalition, which includes the Kumeyaay and Original Peoples Alliance, Union del Barrio, Tipey Joa Native Warriors and American Indian Movement of Southern California.
“San Diego County is home to 19 federally recognized tribes, all of whom have suffered death, enslavement, rape, forced relocation, and dissociation from their linguistic and cultural practices at the hands of the Spanish military and the Mission system,” said Grace Alvarez Sesma, a representative of the coalition, in a letter to the San Diego school board. “It is an affront to the original stewards and caretakers of this land that we all live on and benefit from to name an educational institution after their oppressor, and furthermore the mascot of that institution after their murderer.”
San Diego city’s Human Relations Commission supports the name change, saying that the Serra school name harms children because of its connection to “our broken and racist past.”
“As with the confederate names, using the name of Father Junipero Serra for school names and symbols has a traumatizing impact on students, families, teachers, and staff of all backgrounds,” the commission wrote in a letter to the superintendent and former board president.
Kevin Eckery, spokesman for the Catholic Diocese of San Diego, said it’s up to the community and school board to decide what to name a school and there are many factors that go into that decision.
“As Catholics, we are grateful for the sacrifices made by St. Junipero Serra and for bringing our faith to California,” Eckery said in an email. “The Mission Era remains a very important part of California’s history. Studying that history, and learning from it, is what education is all about….”
The above comes from a March 9 story in the San Diego Union-Tribune.
Learn both sides of the Spanish-Native People history. Apparently, Serra was a good man, but many Spaniards actions were less than exemplary.
That’s true. But, this was not Conquistador HIgh School. It was named in honor of a man who defended the rights of the indigenous people. Change the offensive mascot. Fr. Serra/Saint Junipero was not a conquistador. Apparently the school board didn’t learn the history of the period well (or they bowed to leftist totalitarians).
When will the City of San Diego and associated public school districts change their names?
After all, San Diego was a Franciscan friar and missionary too. (Or, maybe they don’t know Spanish or history.)
Completely agree with you. They gave up the intercession and protection of a great man. They will someday learn this and realize their protest did nothing to change the actions of the actual conquistadors, and lost them some great heavenly assistance.
San Diego = St. James the Great, known to the Spanish of the Reconquista as Santiago or St. James the Moor-Slayer. Better not tell the neds down south about THAT.
A rattler? Like the emblem on the “Don’t Tread on Me” flag? Oh no, Mr. Bill! White Supremacy!
Tom, San Diego is named after Saint Didacus (San Diego de Alcala), a Franciscan friar and missionary to the Canary Islands. That is whom the mission basilica is named in honor of. San Diego is the special heavenly patron of the Franciscan friars who are brothers. Pope Sixtus V, himself a Franciscan, canonized Brother Diego in 1588.
Now, as far as the snake goes, Satanists and Luciferians might object to that depiction. Or, they might not.
Two future Karens. I feel sorry for their future husbands or — what is more likely — “wives”.
As the agenda to de-Christianize society continues, the California Department of Education is aiming to mandate the worship of pagan deities in public school curriculums.
I read about that. Horror!
Canyon? ……. Hills?
I live on the Plains
and am deeply offended
i feel overlooked
don’t MY feelings count ???
So then you MUST change every Spanish name of cities and streets in California for they were named by the Spanish priests!! Aunt Jemima, Uncle Ben’s, Land o Lakes, Cream of Wheat, Speedy Gonzalez, all minorities stripped from boxes of food by WHITE LIBERALS all of these were beloved by ALL RACES’s that’s one reason I bought Aunt Jemima syrup because of here smile and welcoming face. White Liberals are creating racism not stopping it.
Me not care
what name school called
This post is an example of white racism. It mocks and stereotypes Native and Indigenous peoples as well as implies that the way whites speak English is the norm or the only acceptable way to communicate, which is an act of white supremacy and cultural imperialism. Now that these young students have succeeded in eliminating their school’s offensive former name, maybe they can advocate for getting rid of whiteness in the academic curriculum next.
Please stop writing here in English. Using English is co-operating with white supremacy and cultural imperialism.
@ Kris – Ah …. The Lady doth protest too much, as Mr. Shakespeare was wont to say!! Oh, and there’s a neat little definition of “bigot” you can find online. That’s the word that popped into my head when reading your screed.
We Catholics do not want our great saint’s name adorning a God-less government school.
venomous serpent ….. good
white man …….. bad
u can learn a lot at this school
This is the kind of literary and communicative diversity that schools need to teach, model and foster. If I were your literature teacher, you’d get an “A” for this insightful essay.
Throwing Padre Serra out of a public school is like tossing early Christians out of the Colosseum in Rome. Obviously these knuckleheads have no real education. These are the same folks who yell “Science!” and then think that a baby in the womb is just a clump of cells and that people can change their XX Chromosomes to XY Chromosomes and that it’s possible for a human who was born with XX chromosomes to become pregnant. and then decide to abort the “unwanted pregnancy”. These are the same folks that think that our country should be more like Venezuela or Cuba and that the term “White Privilege” isn’t racist.
I once told a woman that Padre Serra was Hispanic. She was indignant and said: “No he wasn’t! He was Spanish!” I had to laugh.
Anonymous March 13, 2021 at 5:26 am:
Да, точно. Хороший момент!
Yes, exactly. Good point!
English IS intrinsically racist.
Glad I speak American.
I remember asking a teacher there back in 1988 whether he thought the name would change. Without missing a beat, he replied “of course.” He thought it would probably be renamed Serra Mesa High or something like that. I’m surprised the name did not change for 32 years after that teacher made the prediction.