It's Official: Guilford Is Now Home Of The 'Grizzlies'​

GUILFORD, CT — The removal of the culturally offensive 'Indian' mascot moniker last summer led to a months-long process in the search for a new mascot that included stakeholders from students to residents. Now, after a final student vote, it's been decided.

Go, Guilford Grizzlies!

Here's the letter from Guilford High School Principal Julia Chaffe and athletic director Jake Jarvis:

Dear GPS Community,

We are excited to share news of the selection of a new mascot for Guilford High School. Following a process inclusive of our school community, the greater Guilford community, and ultimately decided by current and future students, Guilford High School will now be the home of the Grizzlies!

The search for a new mascot began in July following the June 29, 2020, unanimous decision by the Board of Education (BOE) to discontinue the use of the Indian as our school’s moniker. This decision was made after much input from Native American tribes, experts, community members, and many students (past and present). On September 14, 2020, the BOE approved Policy #1349: School Symbols which states in part, “The Board prohibits any use or reference to a race or ethnic group as a School Symbol.” Importantly, as a school we are committed to honoring Native Americans by educating students in our classrooms, and providing teachers with educational support and resources to expand these critical conversations.

On July 1, we asked you to participate in the process of identifying a new mascot, a mascot that will bring us together as a community, by sending us your ideas or by volunteering to serve on our search committee. By August, over 300 submissions were received from students, families, staff, and friends throughout Guilford. The Mascot Search Committee was formed with representation from these key stakeholders and tasked with paring down the submissions to a list of semifinalists.

On November 23 and 24, students in grades 5 - 12 from Baldwin, Adams, and GHS took part in a survey to select and rank their top five mascot choices from the list of 14 semifinalists provided by the search committee. During the week prior to voting, the semifinalist options were shared with the local media and directly with the deciding students and their families to encourage discussion about the choices.

On December 7 and 8, the students were presented with the five finalists that received the highest scores from the rank ordering on the November survey and asked to rank them from 1 to 5, with 1 as their favorite and 5 as their least favorite. Once again, the week prior to voting, the five finalists were shared with the community and with the students and families.

The survey scores were determined using weighted calculations with choices ranked first assigned a value of 5 and those ranked fifth a value of 1. The number of first, second, third, fourth and fifth place votes for each mascot choice were multiplied by their weighted value and added together for their final scores. Results are as follows:

Mascot Finalist
Total Score
Grizzlies
6,061
Eagles
5,311
Seahawks
5,116
Hawks
4,916
Gryphons/Griffins
4,816

It is important to note that the Grizzlies received both the highest number of first place votes and the highest overall score from the rank ordering totals.

We are tremendously grateful to everyone for your thoughtful participation in this inclusive process. We believe that our new mascot is one that we can all take pride in and rally around. We look forward to sharing our plans as we transition to our new mascot.

Go Grizzlies!

Julia Chaffe
Principal, Guilford High School
Jake Jarvis
Athletic Director