SCPS Not Alone in Addressing School Name Changes
When fighting a battle it often feels as if we are standing alone. We often do not realize many others are addressing similar challenges and fighting a similar battle but in a different location.
Other local public school systems within Virginia and throughout the country are faced with school renaming challenges. For example, during May 2024, in Loudoun County, Virginia the Black History Committee recommended renaming nine schools identified as “named for people, places, or ideas related to slavery or the Confederacy.” One of these nine schools is known as Ball’s Bluff Elementary School. The committee’s recommended changing the name of this school even though it was name after a geographic location because a Civil War battle was fought there and the Confederacy won. The Loudoun County school system estimated that it would cost between $1.1 and $1.25 million dollars to rename all nine of these schools. The committee is still evaluating whether a tenth school named after a Revolutionary War Cavalryman, John Champe, should also be renamed which would add an additional $640,000-$650,000 to the price tag.
The Chicago Public Schools are considering renaming 30 schools. The San Francisco Board of Education voted to rename 44 schools who were “named after prominent figures, in an attempt to purge the district of homages to what it said were controversial people with ties to racism, sexism, or slavery, including schools named after George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Abraham Lincoln.
Two neighboring public school systems in Maryland are also experiencing the same challenges with renaming schools.
During March 2022, the Harford County School Board voted to change the name of two schools named after slave owners. They were William Paca Elementary School and the John Archer School. William Paca is a signer of the Declaration of Independence and served as Governor of Maryland during the Revolutionary War. Archer is known at the first graduate of Medicine in America (1768), his home is called “Medical Hall” and he is buried in a cemetery just down the road from the school named after him. The Superintendent of Schools in Harford County said, “Maintaining the name of an owner of enslaved persons as part of a name of a school is inconsistent with the school system’s educational mission.”
The Charles County Public Schools in southern Maryland is currently going through a process to determine whether they should change the name of General Smallwood Middle School because he enslaved others during the 1700s event thought Smallwood served as a member of the Maryland Assembly before the Revolutionary War, served as a General in the Continental Army during the war, was wounded twice for the cause of freedom and liberty, and served as Maryland’s Governor for three terms after the war.
The Charles County School Board estimated that it will cost between $64,500-124,500 to change the name of this middle school. But it is not clear how the school system determined this estimate. This estimate may be too low. At the Charles County School board meeting in June, it was noted that the names of 10-12 county schools may need to be changed. If $100,000 is a better estimate of the average cost to change the name of a school, then Charles County taxpayers could soon be asked to foot the bill for over $1,000,000 dollars. It is doubtful these name changes could be accomplished without a significant increase to the tax rate in Charles County.
If you would like help those in Maryland who oppose this change and are willing to provide feedback to the Charles County School Board about the potential name change of General Smallwood Middle School use the following email address to send a message to all nine school board members:
You can also call (301) 932-7724 and provide a message that will be distributed to all nine school board members.
Thank you in advance for any assistance you may offer to those in Maryland who are trying to prevent its history from being erased.
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