Before, Chávez was a revered Latino labor leader. Now, Davis is grappling with his legacy.

PHOTO: Multiple murals of Chávez can be found around Davis, including one at Chávez Elementary (left) and one at Korematsu elementary (right). There is also a bust of Chávez in front of the elementary school that bears his name, which was found covered a few days after the New York Times investigation was published.

By Alexandra Maduros & Alyssa Hwang

BlueDevilHUB.com Staff–

During her seven years at César Chávez Elementary, junior Ruby Deering remembers participating in mock-marches around her school and making protest signs to celebrate the United Farm Workers (UFW) movement and its revered leader.

For years, junior Kyle Kwak ate lunch next to an honorary mural of Chávez at the elementary school that depicted him reading to children on a field

Morgan Mooney-McCarthy, who attended Chávez Elementary nearly 20 years ago, recalls looking up to César Chávez as a student. She remembers meeting Dolores Huerta when she came to speak at Chávez, and feeling inspired to learn more about the farmworkers movement.

Deering, Kwak and Mooney-McCarthy all remember walking past the bust of Chávez prominently placed in front of the front office and feeling proud of their school’s namesake.

That all changed on March 18.

That’s the day the New York Times released an article uncovering a history of sexual misconduct from César Chávez, the long-revered face of farmworker and Latino rights in the United States.

The report detailed a multi-year investigation into credible sexual misconduct allegations against Chávez, a shock to alumni and community members. The findings revealed that Chávez groomed numerous underage girls during his lifetime, and raped former UFW vice president Dolores Huerta.
Chávez died in 1993, four years before the elementary school on Anderson Rd. was named in his honor.

School Board stands with survivors

DJUSD School Board President Hiram Jackson contacted Superintendent Matt Best as soon as he read the news. With a school named after Chávez and a resolution to acknowledge César Chávez Day approved by the board just a week earlier, Jackson knew they needed to take action quickly.

“These issues matter to us a lot and we don’t want to in any way normalize it by ignoring it in some way,” Jackson said. A statement was released by the district by the next day. The question quickly became what would happen to the name of Chávez Elementary. The board discussed this question as an agenda item at the school board meeting on April 2.

During the meeting, board members unanimously agreed to move forward with renaming and discussed possible approaches to the process. They also unanimously agreed to rescind the resolution that acknowledged César Chávez Day.

The renaming process will be done by a committee, the details of which are still being decided.

The board shared the goal of having a new name in time for the start of the next school year. However, with the end of this school year quickly approaching, this could be difficult.

“Given the speed with which other (school districts) have moved, I think it’s important for us to at least be on top of this,” Jackson said. “I’d say the school year is probably the biggest obstacle.”

Parents, alumni weigh in

As the board moves forward with the renaming process, one thing that is agreed upon by both trustees and community members is that the Chávez community should be heavily involved in the discussion.

Katie Dooley-Hedrick is a parent leader in the Spanish Immersion Parents and Teachers booster group. She hopes that the new name will be chosen with care and consideration.

“Some people will say it should just go back to West Davis Elementary School, which is what it was before there was the Spanish immersion program,” Dooley-Hedrick said. “But I think what is lost in that is that the program at Chávez is more than a Spanish immersion program.”

Many former students also see the need for changing the name. “I think it’s a good idea (to rename the school),” Kwak said. “Just because he (did) good does not cancel out the bad.”

Deering agrees with Kwak, and believes that if the school were to be renamed, it should still honor the farmworkers movement. “I would say (I feel) more of an attachment to the school itself than the person Chávez. Because when I think of (the school), I don’t really think of him,” she said. “I honestly vote for naming it Dolores Huerta Elementary.”

Renee Andrews and Darlene Loyola, the first two Spanish immersion teachers in Davis, attended the April 2 board meeting to share their support for renaming the school after Gabriela Mistral.

Gabriela Mistral was actually the name Andrews and Loyola lobbied for back in 1997.

“I wanted a woman and Gabriela Mistral was from Chile and she was a Nobel Prize winner for literature,” Andrews said.

No matter what Chávez Elementary will be renamed to, the transition will come with challenges.

“We do a lot of events, and all of those things are gonna need to be rebranded and also communicated,” Dooley-Hedrick said.

More than a name

As a Spanish immersion school among a sea of English-speaking schools, Chávez Elementary naturally fosters a unique community.

“I think with (language and cultural immersion) comes a unique community of really dedicated and engaged parents,” Dooly-Hedrick said. “We have several teachers who came up through the program that are now teaching; many of our teachers send their own kids through it.”

“Up until college, Chávez was probably the most important years of my education. It felt like it built who I became later on in life,” Mooney-McCarthy said. “It just opened my eyes to communities that otherwise I might not have been exposed to. It helped me want to help those communities and really be a resource to them with my bilingual education.”

Chávez Elementary’s history also contributes to its tight community. It wasn’t always accepted.

“There was a group that was actively going against Spanish immersion in the community (when it first started),” Andrews said. “When Darlene and I were at Birch Lane, they actually had anti-Spanish
immersion barbecues where they raised money to go against us.”

As a result, teachers and families of the program grew close, largely relying on each other for support. With this closeness to the school, many felt personally affected when they heard the allegations revealed in the Times article.

“It was a real affront to wake up and think, ‘Oh, God.’ Like I was having conversations with my 8-year-old about sexual violence and child abuse because we had to talk about why her school might not be César Chávez anymore,” Dooley-Hedrick said.

Those difficult conversations are happening around the school district.

Controversy in the classroom

Every year around March 31, Chávez’s birthday, DHS teacher Janice Candelario teaches her Spanish classes about Chávez.

Candelario shows the 2014 movie “Cesar Chávez,” teaches her students words related to the farmworkers movement, and has had Bob Ross, the son of Chávez’s former mentor Fred Ross, speak to her class.

This year, however, the lesson took an unexpected turn.

“We had just watched the movie. Chávez was up on that pedestal, and everyone’s like, ‘Wow, what an amazing man,” Candelario said. “Then two days later, after we finished, one of my students said, ‘Did
you hear about Chávez in the news today?’ And I just couldn’t believe it.”

After hearing the news, Candelario reopened the conversation about Chávez.

“(I had) students do a wrap-up writing, (the week after spring break) about how they think we should remember César Chávez’s birthday, (…), do we need to change the school names, the street names, and what should we change them to? And what other big problems does this open up?” Candelario said.

Next year, Candelario will be changing how she teaches about Chávez, but she will definitely continue to teach about the farmworkers movement. She thinks it’s important to remember that the movement was more than just one person.

“We (will) recognize (in class) that he did a lot as far as the leader goes, but he was also very flawed,” Candelario said.

DHS social studies teacher Kevin Williams is also navigating how to adjust conversations about Chávez in his classes.

“I usually show a video (about Chávez), which I won’t this year. I’ll probably find something on Dolores. It’s easy to do, maybe focus more on the Filipino strikes,” Williams said. “There’s always something you can kind of refocus your energy on.”

Williams previously had multiple posters of Chávez in his classroom. All but one of them have now been taken down, with a photo of Dolores Huerta covering Chávez’s face on the one remaining.

“I felt if I took it down completely, that erases that conversation, and personally, I am not for erasing history. I don’t think we should glorify people who have done bad things, but I don’t think we should erase the conversation,” Williams said.

At Chávez Elementary, navigating the conversations around the allegations comes with even more difficulty.

“Our school community needs support from the district right now in the way of resources for our teachers to have age-appropriate curricula and talking points to help our students navigate,” Dooley-Hedrick said.