In the Oct. 19 article concerning the process of choosing a mascot for Skowhegan-based School Administrative District 54, Superintendent Brent Colbry said, “The process for selecting a new mascot will be similar to the organized model used for assembling a school budget.” In whose world does this even make sense?

Assembling a budget and choosing a mascot for the kids at school are not anywhere close enough in the scheme of planning to even pretend this is an appropriate and workable process. Choosing a mascot should not be long, drawn out, complicated or cumbersome. It would seem to me and many others that this process was chosen to appease those who cannot let go of their juvenile past and also allows for a certain administrator to move on in retirement, thereby passing the buck to the next one. And the next one could conceivably be one close by who does not want to make waves before the scepter is passed.

We have some school board members who are calculating and vindictive because they lost the honest vote when the mascot was “respectfully retired.” The chairwoman of the board runs the meeting and uses the gavel as a way of supporting the egotistical views of other board members who can’t retire their own adolescent memories and move on. We also have a board member who stated that a community member feels that because he was ” an Indian” and his father was “an Indian”  the mascot should remain an Indian. This same board member is suggesting that the community, not the students, have a stronger say in the selection.

Sorry, hate to burst the “old teen bubble” but it’s not up to the community. It’s up to the students of this school who want to go on to a field or a court like those at other schools, and have fun with a mascot amidst the cheers, roars, competitions, and enjoyment of their high school years in this type of arena.

The process could be done by winter break if not before. Have students from each grade sign up to be on a committee along with a couple of advisers, choose a few ideas, put it out to the student body to vote on — and it’s done. It’s theirs to do.

And to the community members who like to call themselves “Indians” — you are not an Indian, you never were, you never will be. That belongs to the Native Americans who were in this country long before any of our ancestors showed up on their ships.

The only reason this has turned in to such a divisive and contentious issue is because some people haven’t heard it’s time to grow up. The students are far better and more capable of handling their school life than they are credited for. Let them enjoy it.

Maureen Delahanty is a resident of Canaan.

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