The Ravenswood School Board has dropped Cesar Chavez’s name from a middle school in East Palo Alto and renamed it Ravenswood Middle School.
The board voted unanimously to change the name of the school at 2450 Ralmar Ave. to Ravenswood after reports that Chavez had raped and sexually abused women when he led the farm workers unionization movement.
School board member Jenny Varghese Bloom said she asked her almost 90-year-old neighbor what she thought of the name Ravenswood before the vote. The neighbor said Ravenswood was a good name because it would put the school on the map.
“People know who we are, and they need to know more of who we are,” Varghese Bloom said.
Board member Samuel Tavera said he was happy with the process as it lifted student voices. He said the process fulfilled the district’s promise to students to help them find joy in the communities they are part of.
Meetings and a survey
The district has had a lengthy process, with multiple community meetings since April 27, to gather input on the new name. The district had a survey with 170 responses, according to Superintendent Gina Sudaria. A total of 106 students, 38 parents, 106 employees and 22 community members gave feedback to the board, according to Sudaria. The top contender was Ravenwood Middle School, with support from 59 participants.
The school will be returning to its name, Ravenswood, from 1980, when the campus split into a K-5 and middle school program. Green Oaks Academy operated as the K-5 portion of the school. In later years, Cesar Chavez Academy started using the campus and it became Cesar Chavez & Green Oaks Academy.
The district restuctured the middle school in 2019 and the board at the time voted to change the name to Cesar Chavez Ravenswood Middle School.
Another school name to change
The board is also renaming Costano Elementary School after Edwin Magana-Lopez, an archaeologist at Stanford. The word “costano” is offensive to the Ohlone tribe. The process of renaming the elementary school will begin after students from The Primary School settle in, Sudaria said.
Mark Zuckerberg and his wife, Dr. Priscilla Chan, decided to close The Primary School, forcing over 400 students to find a new school. Most of those students will end up in the Ravenswood City School District.
The Palo Alto school board changed the names of two middle schools in 2018 because board members believed their namesakes had advocated for the eugenics movement. David Starr Jordan Middle School was renamed to Frank S. Greene Jr. Middle School, and Lewis Terman Middle School was renamed to Ellen Fletcher Middle School. Greene was a tech pioneer and Fletcher was a former city council member who was an advocate for bicycling.
Thank Goodness they didn’t name the school after Bill Cosby, Eric Swalwell, Bill Clinton or Willie Brown!
In this politically-charged climate, the only safe name for a school is a number — PS2 or MS15.