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Week of June 9, 2022
ELBERT COUNTY, COLORADO
A publication of
ElbertCountyNews.net
VOLUME 127 | ISSUE 17
New leader takes reins at Kiowa Schools Travis Hargreaves steps into superintendent role after resignation of Silvia McNeely BY CHANCY J. GATLIN-ANDERSON SPECIAL TO COLORADO COMMUNITY MEDIA
The Kiowa Schools fight song with phrase “Go Indians” is on a large banner in the gym.
and residents of the town of Kiowa had reactions including disappointment, anger and fear when Colorado Senate Bill 21-116 was signed into law by Gov. Jared Polis in June 2021. The law imposed a broad ban on Native mascots, with the prospect of $25,000 monthly fines for schools that did not comply by June 1 of this year. In the first few months after Polis signed SB21-116, the then-superintendent of Elbert County School District C-2 (Kiowa Schools), Silvia McNeely, released several statements indicating that Kiowa Schools would work to comply with the new bill.
Travis Hargreaves, who had been serving as principal of Kiowa Schools since summer 2021, is taking over the role of district superintendent after the resignation of Silvia McNeely, who served as superintendent for 10 months. Hargreaves was appointed as interim superintendent in a 5-0 vote at the Kiowa Hargreaves School Board’s May 10 meeting, where the board also voted to accept McNeely’s April 30 resignation. The motion to accept McNeely’s resignation passed 4-1, with Board Member Stephanie Buker opposed. McNeely Hargreaves will assume the role of superintendent this month. Per regulations, the board on May 10 opened the superintendent position for 14 days, though members already had Hargreaves in mind as the desired candidate.
SEE MASCOT, P4
SEE SCHOOLS, P2
PHOTO BY CHANCY J. GATLIN-ANDERSON
Keeping Indians mascot was struggle Kiowa School District now puts priority on curriculum, Native programs BY CHANCY J. GATLIN-ANDERSON SPECIAL TO COLORADO COMMUNITY MEDIA
When the Kiowa School District succeeded in keeping its Indians mascot last month, it marked the end of the district’s lengthy effort to be exempted from a state law that generally bans Native American mascots, with Kiowa being the only Colorado district that has been removed from a non-compli-
ance list while keeping its mascot. Only two other schools in Colorado — Arapahoe High School with its Warriors mascot and Strasburg High School with its Indians mascot — are approved to retain Native American mascots, and both Arapahoe and Strasburg were never included in the mascotban law and were never on the noncompliance list. People involved in the ultimately successful effort to keep the Kiowa Indians mascot shared their accounts of the process with the Elbert County News. Initial plans to comply Like some other locations around Colorado that had Native mascots, the Kiowa School District
INSIDE: CALENDAR: PAGE 9 | VOICES: PAGE 10
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