Clover Park High Narrows New Mascot To Four Choices, Seeks Input

LAKEWOOD, WA — The Clover Park School District is asking students, parents, and other community members to help choose between four new mascots for Clover Park High School.

The school's old mascot, the Clover Park Warriors, is being ousted to comply with a new state law, House Bill 1356. As The News Tribune first reported, the law prohibits the inappropriate use of Native American names, symbols or imagery in public school names, logos, mascots, or team names.

After consulting with the Puyallup Tribe of Indians and Native American staff and students, the school determined the Warriors name is in violation of the law, and it intends to change the name by the end of the 2021-22 school year.

“We recognize that many Clover Park High School alumni are proud of their high school and associate their school mascot with school pride; however, based on SHB 1356, it is clear that the school’s current mascot must change,” Superintendent Ron Banner said. “Together we can build a new legacy of school pride unifying alumni and current CPHS students, staff and families.”

The district says it had considered replacing imagery and keeping the Warriors name intact, but found it could not easily disassociate the name from the decades of Native American imagery it has been attached to over the last 50 years.

"The school’s connection to the Native American imagery is too engrained in the mascot name and cannot be easily ignored by selecting new imagery for the name Warriors," the district said.

After polling students at Clover Park High, school leaders have identified four potential replacement mascots:

• Dragons
• Grizzlies
• Mustangs
• Timberwolves

"This change provides us with an important opportunity for our school to create a new mascot that positively reflects our CPHS values, creed and culture," Clover Park High School Principal Tim Stults said in a statement.

The district has posted a survey, in English and in Spanish, asking community members, students and parents to choose which of the four names they like best. A final selection will then be made sometime later this month, after which Clover Park High will "immediately" begin using the new mascot name. Imagery, equipment, uniforms, signage and materials will then be replaced sometime later this school year.

Clover Park High isn't the only school making changes to comply with House Bill 1356. Previously, Bethel High School changed its name from the Bethel Braves to the Bethel Bison, the News Tribune reported.

>> Take the Clover Park School District's survey