Orange County Fla. School Board Changes Name of Robert E. Lee Middle School

Orlando Sentinel ^ | 14 February 2017 | Annie Martin

[Rebeleye]

At the urging of parents and others from the College Park neighborhood, the Orange County School Board voted 7-1 to change the name during a regular meeting Tuesday night.

[Rebeleye]

Robert E. Lee Middle School, a name that many say harks back to a dark period in American history, will become College Park Middle.  At the urging of parents and others from the College Park neighborhood, the Orange County School Board voted 7-1 to change the name during a regular meeting Tuesday night. The decision wraps up a year-and-a-half-long process that has included community surveys.  Kat Gordon, Orange’s only black school board member, said she tried to change the name of Lee decades ago when her own children were students there. District leaders then wouldn’t hear it.  “In so many words, they told us to go back to our community and be glad we were even accepted at Robert E. Lee,” she said. The dissenting vote came from board member Christine Moore, who represents Apopka and other areas of northwest Orange. She said the majority of her constituents did not want to change the school’s name.  Lee opened in 1956 as Robert E. Lee Junior High School, a whites-only school. The campus is now diverse: 60 percent of the students are black. Latinos, Asians and multi-racial students make up about one-fifth of the student body. The district expects to spend $20,000 to scrub the Lee name from places like signs, the gym floor and athletic uniforms.

Support for a new name has been strong but not unanimous in the community. A 2016 survey of Orange parents, students, employees and others showed 56 percent wanted to call the school something else. More than a dozen people spoke Tuesday during a public comment period. Opponents, including Robert Lynn, pointed out that Lee was a well-respected man. Lynn also disputed the notion that the school was named in protest of school segregation.  “The 1954 decision had nothing to do with it,” he said. But others, including Julie Montione, said they saw the decision to name a school after Lee as “an act of rebellion.” “This is our moment to decide what kind of message we want to send our community,” said Montione, whose daughter is zoned to attend Lee. “Our board does not look like the board in 1956, and our message is not the same.” Similarly, Marsha Hall, whose children may attend Lee when they’re older, told board members she understands they can’t change history, but urged them to choose a new name that reflects the “inclusion and kindness” of the community. “Change the name and send the message to my African-American son and daughter that we not only care about how they represent the school, but how the school represents them,” she said. 

[Maudeen]

“Our board does not look like the board in 1956, and our message is not the same.”

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And we know the education going on in this district isn’t the same either!

[simpson96]

Those 7 that voted to change the name, will proffer not one cent of the $20,000 it cost to have the name physically removed. ‘Other people’s money’...

[TMA62]

“Our board does not look like the board in 1956, and our message is not the same.”

____________________________________________

Your current test scores aren’t like those in 1956. What’s your point?

[headstamp 2]

[Robert E. Lee Middle School, a name that many say harks back to a dark period in American history, ]

What would these PC idiots know about real history.

[Lurkinanloomin]

Pussies.

Robert E. Lee was one of the finest Americans to ever live.

[Lexington Green]

Yale University is named for a slave trader…

Elihu Yale (5 April 1649 – 8 July 1721) was an American-born British merchant, philanthropist and slave trader, President of the East India Company settlement in Fort St. George, at Madras, and a benefactor of the Collegiate School in the Colony of Connecticut, which in 1718 was renamed Yale College in his honor.[1]

[Yo-Yo]

Does this mean we’re going to have to give back Arlington Cemetery to the Lee family?

[SharpRightTurn]

Robert E. Lee Middle School ... will become College Park Middle.”

Not “Al Sharpton Middle School” or Hugo Chavez Middle School”?

[FlingWingFlyer]

When I was a kid, the public schools used to TEACH American history, not ERASE it. As an American, I’ve got a problem with this.

[\/\/ayne]

There goes, a Robert E Lee... and he’s gone.

[Trump20162020]

At this point, I'm surprised there's anything left. Every year we get dozens of these types of stories; they're tearing down statues, re-naming roads/schools, removing flags, etc.

How much more is left before the whitewash is fully complete?

[Iron Munro]

They should come up with something catchy and more up to date.

- Malcolm X Middle School

- The Al Sharpton/Tawana Brawley Middle School

- Only Black Lives Matter Middle School

- The Mohammed Atta and Marwan Al-Shehhi Middle School

- The Bill Ayers-Bernerdine Dhorn Middle School

- The Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan Middle School

- Muslim Brotherhood Middle School

- The Nidal Hasan Middle School

[Iron Munro]

At this point, I'm surprised there's anything left. Every year we get dozens of these types of stories; they're tearing down statues, re-naming roads/schools, removing flags, etc.

A nation of Winston Smiths rewritting history - Just as George Orwell warned in his book "1984".

[hal ogen]

Did these morons change it to Robert Byrd???

[lurk]

Lee was so above race and other issues, this is laughable.

Lee, Jackson and other Virginians had a much more simple goal: to remove intruders’ boots from Virginian soil.

[reg45]

I’m just glad that it’s not Barack Obama Middle School.

[Organic Panic]

If you erase history, it will just go away. Why “black history month?” Why should we have to learn about slavery when it makes me uncomfortable? Why do we have to name everything for MLK when it makes me uncomfortable that we had democrats beat and oppress black Americans? Why do we have memorials and schools named after slaves when “that’s not who we are?”

[jch10]

To TRAYVON MARTIN MIDDLE SCHOOL?

[PeteyBoy]

This will be fresh in a few more minds of voters in the 2018 mid terms.

I hope they keep this up!