Changing the petition after people had already signed it was unethical. No matter what the reasoning was, there is no way to justify such actions. Numerous people were under the impression that the petition was to include “mangy” in Mangy Lions. Agreeing with this, signatures flooded in.

Founder of the petition, Elkhart Central senior, Patrick Yeakey, told GENESIS after the petition was altered that, “We’ve had no intent to put the mangy back into lions…”

Which solidifies the fact that the only possible excuses for this mishap is an intentional move at retaining Mr. B, or a complete lack of ability to describe what their goal was without adult supervision.

Regardless of what people assumed it meant, the petition should have been removed and a new one, with no signatures, should have been uploaded. Morally, it would be more rewarding to know that all the signatures which were received are for one’s actual cause and not due to a miscommunication.

Now, regarding the new petition, take a moment to think about it. A Central High School student proposed to change the mascot to “Charging Blazers.” While on the surface, this may seem like a good way to combine both mascots and not leave anyone out, it is not.

How often is a school really called by their full name? Crimson Chargers? Blue Blazers? Hardly ever. “Charging Blazers” would turn into “Blazers” before the school board even finished signing the paper.

Whether it was intentional or not, it’s not hard to see what would happen if this was our mascot. And it’s not hard to assume that the students at Central knew it too.

Moving forward, there needs to be a meeting of some sort. We need both schools to voice their concerns, their ideas, and their opinions. Unity is going to be forced upon us before we know it, so we might as well come together and find a happy medium now, so that we can start out on the right foot.

The views in this staff editorial do not necessarily reflect the views of Elkhart Memorial High School or Elkhart Community Schools. Reach our EIC’s at jdouglas[email protected] and/or [email protected].