NYC’s elite Collegiate School rips God and patriotism out of logo, motto to combat racism

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The apostles of woke-ism have pinned another win to their robes in the never-ending commitment to inclusivity.

After considerable effort, Manhattan’s elite Collegiate School “not only drastically alter its winking playful mascot image — but also toss ‘God’ from its motto and even ‘A.D.’ from its seal, considering both potentially offensive, the New York Post reported.

A 17-person task force, which included Regina Lasko, the wife of David Letterman, spent three years debating the K-12 school’s “Dutchman” mascot and motto, before issuing a 407-page monstrosity of a report that critics see as “a lesson in wokeness-run-amok,” according to the newspaper.

The goal being to update the Collegiate brand to help “combat within Collegiate the institutional and other racism that pervades so much of our society.”

Photo Source New York Post

“A lot of folks think the whole thing was just ridiculous overkill,” a parent told The Post. “Four hundred pages? For a mascot? A motto?”

The all-boys school that John F. Kennedy Jr. once attended announced in June 2020 that the Board of Trustees voted to update and redesign the school’s brand, in response to the recommendations of a 2019 task force. The task force said the recommendations include the input of parents, alumni, students, and faculty.

“The image is considered by many in our community to be exclusionary and inconsistent with our Statement of Beliefs. The image of the Dutchman has changed a number of times over the years, and it is time to change it again. In addition, the Board voted to update the school seal, so as to remove the two explicit religious references (the “A.D.” and the Latin motto) in light of the school’s legal separation from the Collegiate Church over the last several decades,” a statement said.

“The changes we are announcing should not be viewed as an effort to erase history, but rather to reflect our commitment to being a more inclusive and welcoming community, Collegiate added.

The mascot was seen as a representation of Peter Stuyvesant, the last Dutch governor of the New Amsterdam colony, The Post reported, adding that the board “ditched an image of the school’s happy-go-lucky Dutchman with a shovel for a wholly modernized character with a face shrouded by a hat.”

Unlike the old mascot, who was clearly white, the new logo does not depict a race.

 

Collegiate

The 394-year-old institution also announced last week that it will replace its prior motto, “Unless God, then in vain,” with “Wisdom, Community, Kindness” — in Latin.

Collegiate officials said that both the new motto language and logo design were voted on by 3,000 members of the school community.

“This community worked diligently to design a process that was inclusive of our community, fully aware that a change such as this would garner a range of reactions,” school leaders informed parents in a message last week, according to The Post.

While some Collegiate families see the changes as a reflection of the school’s embrace of woke priorities, others reportedly support the effort. One parent told the newspaper that the new identity was faculty led and that parental interest was limited.

“The kids don’t have the same perspective as a lot of their parents,” a Collegiate mom said. “I think the administration is walking a thin line trying to keep everybody happy.”

Tom Tillison

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