The Virginia State Board of Education voted Friday to restore the names of Confederate leaders to high schools and elementary schools, four years after they were removed.
The Shenandoah County Board of Education voted 5-1 to rename Mountain View High School as Stonewall Jackson High School and rename Honey Run Elementary School as Ashby-Lee Elementary School.
Friday’s vote overturns a 2020 school board decision, when school systems across the South removed Confederate names from schools in response to the Civil War. black lives matter too movement.
School board members who voted to restore the Confederate name said the previous school board ignored public sentiment and due process when it stripped the name.
The 2023 election brought about a major change in the composition of the school board.
Board member Gloria Carlineo said during the six-hour meeting that began Thursday night that people who oppose the Confederate name “undermine real instances of racism,” and that “everything is racist.” “We need to stop bringing in prejudice.”
Kyle Gutshall, the only board member to vote against reinstating the Confederate name, said he respects both sides of the argument, but the majority of residents in his district prefer the Mountain View and Honey Run names. He said he believes they want it to remain as it is.
“I don’t criticize anyone for the decisions they’re making or look down on anyone,” he said. “It’s a complex issue.”
Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson was a Confederate general from Virginia who rose to fame at the First Battle of Bull Run near Manassas in 1861, after he was shot during the battle and had his arm amputated. , died in 1863. Jackson’s name was also removed from another high school in Prince William County, Virginia, in 2020, now known as Unity Reed High School.
Turner Ashby was a Confederate cavalry officer who was killed in action near Harrisonburg, Virginia, in 1862. A high school near Harrisonburg also bears his name. Robert E. Lee was a Virginia native who commanded the Confederate Army.
The resolution approved by the school board on Friday specifies that private donations will be used to pay for the name change.
Shenandoah County is located approximately 160 miles west of the nation’s capital and is a largely rural jurisdiction with a population of approximately 45,000 people.
