New Haven Program to be Named Decoto School for Independent Study

From the New Haven Unified School District:

The Board of Education on Tuesday night approved Decoto School for Independent Study as the name for the District’s new school for independent study students, which will open this fall on the campus of the .

Two names – Decoto School for Independent Study and Itliong-Veracruz School for Independent Study – were forwarded to the Board by the Facility Names Committee, a group a five community members appointed by the Board to consider suggestions and make recommendations. The committee, which met in June, considered 10 names suggested by the community and was charged with recommending no more than three possibilities to the Board.  

The name Decoto was suggested in part because the District closed Decoto Elementary School, located on the same site, when nearby opened in 1998. The school dates back to the 1870s, and the current auditorium has been in use since 1925, although most of the rest of the campus was built in the 1950s.

The name Itliong-Veracruz was submitted in honor of Filipino-American labor leaders Larry Itliong and Philip Veracruz, contemporaries of Cesar Chavez and fellow organizers of the 1965 Delano grape strike that led to the organization of the United Farm Workers movement. Board members asked that time be set aside at a future meeting to consider naming another District facility in honor of the Filipino community.