HANOVER — The Hanover High School mascot search is going back to the drawing board.
At its meeting last week, the Hanover High School Council ad hoc mascot selection committee had introduced a motion for a runoff election between two design submissions, one for the Hawks and one for the Bears. But the committee revealed Wednesday that the Bears design, like eight others that were previously disqualified, also violated the submission criterion of originality.
The committee apologized for how the process was handled — namely, a lack of clarity over what would be deemed original work.
“Our vetting process to determine which submissions were valid did not happen early enough and was not thorough enough,” said Jason Hirschhorn, a math teacher and the staff adviser for the mascot committee.
As a result, the committee asked members of the council to defeat the motion for the runoff, which they did unanimously. The council, which includes students along with some adult members from the staff and community, then approved a new motion to restart the selection process for determining Hanover’s new mascot and logo. The committee will solicit new designs for the five finalists — Huskies, Maroon Crush and Trailblazers in addition to Hawks and Bears.
The committee also hopes to recruit new members and draft a voting plan to be approved by the council once the submissions are received. And this time, they will be a lot clearer on the submission guidelines so that students are not left wondering whether their designs might be disqualified.
“These mistakes negatively impacted people’s trust in the process and in the council,” Hirschhorn said at the meeting. “Mistakes also harmed the designers themselves, who had to deal with a potentially confusing and frustrating process. We are deeply sorry about all of this.”
The Hanover High Council voted in March to replace its Marauder mascot, which dated back to 1951, amid concerns from students and some community members about the symbolic and historical meaning of “marauder.”
Benjamin Rosenberg can be reached at brosenberg@vnews.com or 603-727-3302.