Student Council Supports Keeping Apache Mascot

Arcadia High School’s student council members, asked by their district’s school board to study a political controversy, on Tuesday recommended that the school retain its mascot of 45 years, the Apache warrior.

The vote assures the mascot’s survival. The Arcadia Unified School District board had said it would make the final decision only if the students recommended eliminating the Apache.

Student Council President Oliver Chi said the 22-member group struggled with the issue for eight weeks after members of a local Native American group denounced the use of the Apache as a mascot at a board meeting in early September.

Chi said that after reading reports prepared by teacher Oliver Beckwith’s archeology class, the council learned the Apaches were more than just successful warriors. The tribe honored family values, self-respect and hard work, he said.

The Apache “encompasses what we hope the students are striving for,” Chi said.

Principal Martin Plourde agreed, saying that the school would like to “hold up the Apache as a symbol for the students to look up to.”

Sonny Skyhawk, who was instrumental in convincing the Los Angeles Unified School District to vote unanimously to abolish all Native American “names and images” from the schools, commended the council on its thoroughness but said his organization, the Committee for Native Americans, “vehemently disagrees with its decision to retain [the mascot’s] use.”