A century after a Richmond elementary school took the name of a former superintendent – and Confederate enslaver – two of the most popular suggestions for a new name are Black women who worked to undo the school’s legacy of segregation.
A year after Richmond Public Schools Superintendent Jason Kamras said the district intended to rename three schools named for people with “Confederate ties” – and a few months after the School Board approved the move – John B. Cary Elementary Principal Michael Powell hosted the public in Zoom and in-person meetings to hear ideas. A suggestion form circulated over the past few months.
“Richmond Public Schools is committed to renaming RPS schools named for individuals and symbols that represent racist ideologies, including individuals that served in the Confederate army during the Civil War and/or owned slaves,” Assistant Principal Ketia Singleton said.
She named two key principles: School names should be relevant to Richmond, Virginia or national history, culture, or geography. And any new name “must not discriminate and/or cause offense on the basis of race, ethnicity, religion, disability, or LGBTQ+ identity.”
The most suggested name: Lois Harrison-Jones. Community members ranging from the deacon of her church to a former School Board Chairman Melvin Law extolled her credentials that ranged from becoming the first Black woman superintendent of schools in Virginia to teaching at Harvard.
Law helped see Harrison-Jones appointed to the superintendent position nearly four decades ago. Asked at the in-person meeting if he helped organize the speakers in favor, he said, “I’ve been organizing this since 1985 [the year Harrison-Jones became RPS superintendent].”
Speakers also frequently named Grace E. Harris, the first Black administrator at Virginia Commonwealth University. Initially rejected from a position in 1967 because she was Black, she went on to serve as dean of the School of Social Work and later served as president of the university.
A model school for integration
The building that currently holds the name was originally built for white students in the 1950s as Black students were placed in the original Cary Elementary. Harris’ daughter, Gayle Harris, a former John B. Cary student, spoke to her mother’s role in helping Cary serve as a model school for school integration in the 1960s.
A few speakers – all white – raised issues from budgeting to fears about choosing a name that could offend later. The speakers who suggested Harrison-Jones and Harris were Black.
“I just wanted to put out that while these sound like wonderful and admirable recommendations, I do support naming the school not after a person,” one white parent said. “I would prefer us not to relive the same mistakes we made down the line, spending more money on doing this process again. I’m not saying that would happen with any of these suggestions but that’s a principle I think we should be considering.”
“I support the attention greatly behind renaming the school,” another said, echoing fears about the district’s budget. “It’s important also to make sure this never happens again.”
“I think the names of these individuals are wonderful, but just to avoid any changes in the future, since we’re on Maplewood Avenue, I would like to submit something as simple as Maplewood Elementary,” another chimed in. “You can’t find anything wrong with something named after a tree.”
One parent who said she initially had this fear registered second thoughts at the in-person meeting, held in Cary Elementary’s gym. Janina King-Poulin said that after hearing about the Black community members who played a role in shaping the modern Cary Elementary, she realized she was wrong.
“All of a sudden comparing what we could be naming the school against a tree didn’t feel right,” she said. Her idea: Loving Elementary, after the Virginia couple whose interracial marriage sparked a legal fight that saw racist marriage laws overturned by the Supreme Court.
“I love a double entendre,” she said, adding that the Cary Cougar mascot could easily be changed to the Loving Lions. “Just throw a beard on it and we’re good to go.”
Powell said the next phase of the process would be announced in April. In the meantime, we have asked for copies of all suggested names.
