Teen Alumnae Seek Renaming For Sangster Elementary School

SPRINGFIELD, VA — Teenage alumnae of Sangster Elementary School in the Burke area are pushing the Fairfax County School Board to consider renaming the school.

The students are seeking the name change for the school at 7420 Reservation Road in Springfield due to its Confederate association. The elementary school was named for the community and Sangster Branch stream near its location. The Sangster Branch references the family of Edward Sangster, a Fairfax County sheriff and farmer, and his wife Mary Kendall Lee, who owned land around Sangster Branch in the 19th century. Three of their sons, Thomas, John, and James, fought for the Confederacy during the Civil War.

Only James survived and was believed to have helped evacuate gold and silver from the Confederate treasury as the Union troops advanced toward Richmond. He took an oath of allegiance after the war, returned to Fairfax County and served as a circuit court judge. He died in 1906 and is buried at Lee Chapel Cemetery not far from the school. The family still has descendants in Northern Virginia.

Alumnae seeking the name change posted a "Rename the School" sign outside the elementary school to bring awareness to the name’s history.

"Confederates committed treason to preserve slavery," said Caley Nee, a 15-year-old organizer of the Change the School Name initiative. "Make no mistake, naming a building after somebody honors them, and it’s wrong to honor slaveholders and traitors. We need to live up to our values of a caring culture and show we mean that Black Lives Matter."

Nee reached out to Laura Jane Cohen, the Fairfax County School Board representative for the Springfield District, to ask how to start the renaming process. Cohen told Patch in an email she submitted the item to be a forum topic at a June 22 school board meeting "to take a deeper dive into the name change policy and process and to assure robust community input and feedback."

The Change the School Name website has a petition and encourages residents to contact Cohen about the possible name change.