At its June 2021 meeting the Coxsackie-Athens Central School District Board of Education voted to retire the school mascot and name Indians here at C-A. This has been discussed most recently for several months, though it has been a topic of discussion in our schools for years. Hundreds of school community members expressed their opinions on this topic in a variety of ways. A forum was hosted by the board liaison committee to gather input as well.  The district will now embark on a two-part parallel process. The first part will be to develop and implement a systemic curriculum K-12 that educates our students on the indigenous peoples of our region as well as begin the process of instituting a land acknowledgement on our campuses. These steps represent a starting point in honoring the indigenous peoples, and acknowledging  the land that surrounds us is part of who the indigenous people are, and that it reflects their histories.  The other part will be asking community members and the student body to take an active role in determining a new name/mascot that will bring pride and excitement to the entire C-A Community. The Board of Education liaison committee has sought out volunteers to sit on a Task Force to help steer this process forward.   Goal of Task Force To provide a process that in the end results in a a name/mascot that will bring pride and excitement to the entire C-A Community To bring forward a selection of options that results in a selection that is: Forward thinking; respectful of diversity Not people, persons Represents the entire community-history, geography, and all of our towns Original and unique mascot (not similar to other schools) Able to rebrand with the current school colors Bold, courageous, fierce, prideful, honorable Creates energy and School Spirit The first step is to seek nominations from the entire school community. You may also drop off a nomination at the school offices, public libraries, senior centers, State Telephone office, post offices and local NBC branches. Deadline for nominations will be August 7th. Through voting that the students and community will be involved in we will narrow the choices down so that by mid fall we will have a few final choices that will result in a final selection  The district will then embark on rebranding the district with our new mascot and name while continuing to utilize our traditional C-A interlocking logo as well.