CCS Logo, Mascot Being Phased Out

COOPERSTOWN—Cooperstown Central School officials will systematically phase out the school’s long-serving logo by June 2025. This comes as the result of a November 17, 2022 memorandum issued by the New York State Department of Education regarding an official Commissioner’s Decision—subsequently upheld in the State Supreme Court—indicating that public school districts are prohibited from using Native American mascots. According to CCS Superintendent Sarah Spross in her report to the CCS Board of Education at the meeting of June 21, “arguments that community members support the use of such imagery or that it is ‘respectful’ to Native Americans are no longer tenable.”