Growing up, my first school mascot—aside from the adorable Owls of my kindergarten year—was the Chief. We hailed the rallying cry over a face similar to the one in this photo, and my hometown still has this mascot today—which is why I have yet to take my daughter to a single game of any sport featuring this mascot. There are plenty of other local schools and little league teams we can support for fun without this disturbing perpetuation of racism as our unifying emblem.

When I went to college, I was dismayed to discover that our mascot was once again the Indians. I hadn’t really paid attention to that detail and it was a bit late to transfer, but I joined other voices in calling for a change—and a change did occur. Within a couple of years, the new mascot was the Redhawk, which I love. It’s a cool emblem and it maintains the school colors while not enforcing racist stereotypes or using a person or people as mascots.