“It’s our responsibility to respond to the negative part of history.” said equity and student achievement director at San Juan. This quote defines the faults of today’s world. I believe there is not enough desperation and persistent work being done with identifying and understanding the history of people and groups. Our school system has changed throughout the years. The school names have been an issue to not only me but others have recognized the lack of research.Which is why I want to put an end to the unknown and find out how to incorporate all cultures into school districts. 

 Understanding is the hardest part of having human emotions in my opinion. Yes, there will always be the who, what, when, and why? But to understand is to have a grasp on being good-natured. Historians revealed some dark truth in the former times yet we as a society chose not to acknowledge the baggage we are left. The background of this story starts in 1923 with the Navajo Tribe. The Navajo tribe are from the rocky mountains located in Southwestern Colorado and Northwestern New Mexico. The Navajo tribe is aimed at maintaining harmony with one another and keeping peace within the family. There are 399,494 people a part of the tribe as of today. 

 Unfortunately, the Navajo tribe was pushed out of their land and were involuntary moved following the Mexican-American war in company with the Guadalupe Hidalgo treaty establishment. By law, about ninety-three to five hundred people were forced to relocate. The tribe was not going to go down without a fight so they simply refused. That was until this American man named Kit Carson came along and started a campaign. This campaign's intent was to finally move the Navajo tribe off “America's land”. Carson tortured the tribe by destroying water plantations, along with crops. Carson did this to make the Navajo tribe starve and eventually die. The US government was trying to force the Navajo tribe to take on more American values in order to get rid of their culture altogether. The Navajo people stood their ground and refused. The Navajo tribe could no longer push and surrendered to Kit Carson and the army. This established the “Long walk”. It all began in August 1864. The people who were once living their lives were now being sentenced to deportation and/or whitewashing. I want people to hear this story and understand that the Navajo tribe was easily forgotten when a white man showed up.

 The Navajo tribe had to travel on foot, from Arizona to New Mexico. Which is about 250-450 MI, it’s a 124-hour walk according to Google maps. About 200 people died traveling on the “Long walk”. Carson wanted to help increase the population in the south and that's why he moved the tribe further along. Five years later, the Navajo tribe was ramed in a camp called Fort Sumner. Some were also put in smaller camps such as the Alamo, Ramah, and To'hajiilee. Children were put in educational settings which cause separation between families. The kids were forced to speak English, they were told if they didn't obey the rules they would be sent to hell. The army started digging grave sites. The school’s spread lethal diseases but that's not how they all died. Some died of homicide due to the constant abuse. The Navajo tribe had no idea what freedom was until it was easily taken. They fought for their rights and simply failed because we, America, took that freedom and land to make a “better population.” In 1924, President Calvin Coolidge passed the Indian citizenship act. The Native Americans were now established as US citizens. But in spite of that, they were refrained from voting due to the state laws. They were able to vote by 1957.

With that being said, as I researched the Navajo tribe for my first-semester final I found out that a school in the Sac county school district was named after the “wonderful man” we all know…..Kit Carson. Obviously, I was baffled by this discovery and I felt my blood boiling in anger. How can such a bad man be deceived as a good guy? Well, the answer to that is his skin color. Carson was a pale, milky white man. Which apparently claimed him superior. But the problem is we let that prejudiced act bleed into school systems today. The school systems vary depending on the people in power like the administration which can convey the types of schools in the district. So how can we be an agent of change? By signing this petition to get the county to reconsider the name of Kit Carson Academy.