The Junípero Serra statue at Mission San Gabriel, near Los Angeles.
Foto:
Frederic J. BROWN / AFP / Getty Images
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SAN FRANCISCO – The San Francisco School Board rectified the controversial decision made in January and decided to keep Spanish heritage names like Junípero Serra, Vasco Núñez de Balboa, Mission and Presidio in its public schools.
In a vote late on Tuesday, The seven members of the School Board backed down on a decision that rained criticism and even a legal claim, and that it also included the deletion of references to iconic figures in American history such as Presidents George Washington and Abraham Lincoln.
“The end result of this incredible stubbornness (on the part of the School Board) and the resignation to exercise its responsibilities has been an enormous waste of time and resources,” said this Wednesday in a statement the law firm that sued the educational body. on behalf of alumni of the affected centers.
Thus, at the moment the educational centers have guaranteed the continuity of their names. like the Balboa Institute, named in honor of the explorer Vasco Núñez de Balboa; the Mission institute, near the place where the San Francisco de Asís mission was built, which gave the city its name, and the Presidio school, which is named after the military enclave founded by the Spanish.
The Alvarado school will also be maintained, in honor of the conqueror Pedro de Alvarado; the El Dorado school, named after the mythical place that explorers were looking for; and the Sánchez, Ulloa and José Ortega schools, also named after missionaries and colonizers.
Similarly, sThe Junípero Serra school will be named, creator of the mission system and long considered the founding father of California, but whose figure is increasingly controversial.
The School Board justified the removal of all these names in January because of their links to slavery, oppression, racism or other attitudes that should not be honored.
The decision to remove the names of the schools was harshly criticized Both by those who interpreted it as an extreme exercise of historical revisionism and by those who considered it nonsense for the School Board to prioritize this type of action instead of focusing on reopening the educational centers, closed for a whole year due to the covid-19.
What’s more, procedural errors and lack of transparency occurred in the January vote that approved the suppression of the names, which motivated the legal demand and led a judge to urge the School Board to annul the vote or justify the validity of the process.
The city of San Francisco was founded in 1776 with the establishment of the mission of San Francisco de Asís by Spanish missionaries and after a period as part of the newly independent State of Mexico, it became part of the United States along with the rest of the Alta California in 1848.
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