Three-and-a-half years after beginning the process of renaming a school in the city’s downtown, Edmonton Public Schools has revealed the new name.
In the autumn of 2020, Edmonton Public School Board trustees agreed to change the name of Oliver School.
On Tuesday, the board announced that it will now be called wîhkwêntôwin School (pronounced we-kwen-to-win).
wîhkwêntôwin is a Cree word that can be translated into English as “circle of friends.”
The area to the west of downtown Edmonton, where the school is situated, was recently renamed wîhkwêntôwin by the city after a renaming process overseen by the community league.
The school board stated that students, staff, and families have been involved in the community consultation conducted by the community league, and believe wîhkwêntôwin represents the values of the school community.
“We are very happy to announce this and for the school to share the same name as the community it is part of,” Edmonton Public Schools’ board chair Julie Kusiek said in a statement.
“We are grateful for the work of the wîhkwêntôwin Community League to rename the neighborhood through their ‘Uncover Oliver’ campaign, and for involving the school community in that process
through classroom activities.”
For the Oliver community, the discussion to change the name of the central Edmonton neighborhood started in 2017, during anti-racism rallies held across North America in response to the events in Charlottesville, Va.
A campaign known as #UncoverOliver was initiated to bring to light the history of the man for whom the neighborhood and school were named.
Collaborating with the Indigenous community, the community league launched the #UncoverOliver campaign to share their discoveries about the history of Frank Oliver.
Oliver was a journalist and member of Parliament who co-founded the Edmonton Bulletin, but the community league asserted that some of his actions are why it is advocating for the area to be renamed.
The community league found that Oliver played an active role in displacing the Papaschase and the Michel Bands from their land, and used his newspaper to promote negative stereotypes about Indigenous Peoples.
He also utilized his position as an MP to propose anti-immigration policies that favored people of certain races.
EPSB stated that online and digital updates are in progress, and the introduction of new signage and other changes at the school will occur over the next several months.
