The next development in Richmond’s battle to change its Confederate history has unfolded, with J.E.B. Stuart Elementary School being renamed Barack Obama Elementary School. The Richmond School Board voted 6-1 Monday for the name change, which leaves some rather unhappy, but not for any Lost Cause-related sentiment.
In April, the Board declared that it was looking to rename the school to better define itself with its student population, which is currently 90 percent African-American students. Five public input sessions and an online suggestion portal were organized for the school’s students, teachers, and administrators to have a say in the process.
Many in the community believed the best option was rename the school in the city’s Northside area after a local historical figure, or even the neighborhood itself. To have some real hands-on response, the Richmond Public Schools (RPS) administration had students at the school vote for their top three choices from seven finalists given to them from the renaming team.
According to the Richmond Times-Dispatch, the finalists were:
Northside Elementary: for the location of the school.
Wishtree Elementary: for the children’s book that celebrates different cultures in a diverse neighborhood.
Oliver Hill Elementary: for the Richmond civil rights attorney who helped end the notion of “separate but equal.”
Barbara Johns Elementary: for the young civil rights leader who led a student strike at her Farmville, Virginia, high school.
Albert Norrell Elementary: for the longtime Richmond educator.
Henry Marsh Elementary: for the civil rights attorney and first African-American mayor of Richmond.
Barack Obama Elementary: for the first African-American U.S. president.
Following the June 12 vote, Northside Elementary was the top vote-getter among students, with 190 votes. Obama Elementary garnered 166 votes, with Wishtree earning 127.
Nevertheless, the RPS administration recommended to the Richmond School Board that it should rename J.E.B. Stuart Elementary after Obama. As the Board has followed all recommendations from the administration, they approved the measure.
Before the vote, First District Board member Liz Doerr said, “It would be pretty awesome to have an elementary school in Richmond named after Barack Obama.”
However, her sentiment was not echoed by Kenya Gibson, the School Board’s representative for the Third District, where the school is located – she was the lone vote against the renaming. Initially, Gibson pushed for the vote to be delayed, unsatisfied with the lack of local names included in the administration’s recommendation.
“This is Richmond and we are about history and we have so many great local stories to tell,” Gibson said. “Our local stories are so important to cherish.”
Fourth District representative Johnathan Young, who was not at the meeting, said he would have voted against changing the name of the school.
“Prayerfully we are done renaming buildings and can instead start renovating them,” Young said preceding the vote.
RPS Superintendent Jason Kamras, on the other hand, was highly enthusiastic about the change. “It’s incredibly powerful that in the capital of the Confederacy, where we had a school named for an individual who fought to maintain slavery, that now we’re renaming that school after the first black president,” he said. “A lot of our kids, and our kids at J.E.B. Stuart, see themselves in Barack Obama.”
To be noted, Kamras was an integral part of the Obama presidential campaign in 2008, advising him on education issues.
The estimated cost at the name change now sits at approximately $26,000.
A new wooden sign in the front of the school: $2,500.
A new marquee: $2,500.
A bronze plaque: $4,000.
A new stone facade: $10,000.
New rubber mats: $2,000.
Stationery: $2,000.
Office supplies: $500.
A new banner: $500.
Staff and student T-shirts: $2,000.
Carol Wolf, who unsuccessfully brought up renaming the school in 2003, said she was, “disappointed that we did not honor a local hero.”
Larry Olanrewaju, the board chairman at that time who voted against starting the renaming process, said a month before the organizing started to rename J.E.B. Stuart Elementary that it would have distracted the School Board from its work.
“I did not vote not to rename the school, I voted not to continue the conversation at that time,” Olanrewaju said. “The only reason that would have happened is because there were other things we were dealing with at that time and that wasn’t the appropriate time to take on that issue.”
Unfortunately, the Richmond School Board may believe that a name change will suffice in putting RPS back on track with modern standards. It is still unclear, however, how exactly the modernization plan for the capital city’s education infrastructure will unfold.
Currently, there is a 20-year, $800 million plan to revitalize Richmond’s 43 schools, serving roughly 24,000 school children. But, it is quite sad that Richmond must wait almost an entire generation to have schools wherein there are structurally integral ceilings, working heat and air conditioning systems, working water infrastructure, no hazardous materials from bygone ages, and schools that do not operate wildly over capacity.
Furthermore, it would have been much more positively culturally subjective that J.E.B. Stuart Elementary was renamed after a local hero like the ones listed above. Hopefully, the name change will not further delay motions to address the real inequities of Richmond City schools.
