It’s decided. The Marquette Area Public Schools Board of Education voted during a meeting on Monday to retire the Redmen/Redettes nicknames.

It was more than five years ago when the Marquette Senior High School Nickname Research Committee first recommended that the district discontinue the use of the nicknames.

The MAPS board that was in office in 2020 voted to retire the Native American chief logo and formally adopted the block letter “M” as the logo, a change we supported.

It’s widely understood that the name Redmen originally came from the crimson-red color symbolizing the Harvard University alma mater of a man who served as MAPS superintendent in the 1920s.

Perhaps if the Native American logo had not been introduced about a decade later, this would be a much different discussion. But it was introduced and the connection was made.

One speaker on Monday noted that Native American mascots have been chosen out of respect, but many others disagreed.

We believe the best people to weigh in on the topic are Native Americans themselves.

Rodney Loonsfoot, a member of the Keweenaw Bay Indian Community Tribal Council told the board on Monday that race-based Native American logos, mascots. Names and images can have harmful repercussions.

“The Keweenaw Bay Indian Community Tribal Council formally does here advise, reaffirm and stand in opposition to use of all race-based Indian logos, mascots, names and images are being derogatory, divisive and harmful to Native American tribes and tribal governance,” Loonsfoot said.

The debate has been heated, and ultimately the school board vote was split 4-3 on Monday, and it took nearly five hours to get to that point. Even now, it’s been suggested on social media that the board members who voted to retire the nicknames be recalled, a move we believe would cause many more problems than it would solve.

But that is a question for district voters, but we hope that all sides will continue to debate civilly.

And now that the board has decided to retire the nicknames, we hope the search for a new monicker and mascot will be a unifying experience for the community.

This conversation is best based around what is in the best interest of the children in the district.

We firmly believe that the discussion should be on the mental and emotional health of students.

Although we recognize the need to remember the past, it is not necessary, nor realistic, that our children will have a high school experience just like ours.

Traditions of excellence can still be pursued without focusing on a group of people in our community.

As one of the speakers during public comment noted “Words have power.” We agree, and we think it’s time to use that power for good.