After its historic season, a Cincinnati Public School high school football team now has a day named in its honor thanks to a proclamation by Mayor Aftab Pureval delivered at a district board meeting.
Pride for Taft Information Technology High School was on full display at the Nov. 24 CPS board business meeting, with dozens of parents and players in the audience leading the school’s “TA-FT” chant. Several board members joined them in sporting the school’s signature green and gold colors.
Cincinnati’s Vice Mayor Jan-Michele Lemon Kearney and council member Scotty Johnson took the podium to deliver the proclamation on behalf of Pureval, who was not there. The honors granted to the team coming off of a historic 11-1 season acted as the “major kudos of the evening,” Superintendent Shauna Murphy said.
It’s been 15 years since a CPS high school football team has sustained that kind of winning streak, Murphy said. The last time a team achieved that was in 2010 – which also happened to be the Taft Senators.
The district’s athletic director Josh Hardin and the team’s head coach Tyler Williams joined in on Monday night’s celebration.
The auditorium swelled with applause as Kearney recited the proclamation that read, to celebrate the team’s “historic accomplishments on and off the field,” Nov. 24 is now known as Taft High School Football Day.
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“Thank you all for representing this city in an amazing way when there are odds stacked against you every day,” Johnson said at Monday’s school board meeting.
The team saw a turbulent end to a successful season when damage discovered inside a locker room at Indian Hill High School after the Braves defeated the Senators in the regional semifinals sparked lots of social media debate.
Indian Hill’s superintendent released a statement that a part of the locker room damage predated the game. But some officials in Indian Hill, which is a relatively affluent and majority-white district, maintain that additional damage occurred that night. Meanwhile, some Taft supporters said the team was being unfairly blamed and racially profiled.
The district’s board president, Kareem Moncree-Moffett, called the discourse “deeply disappointing” in a Facebook post made Nov. 20.
“What should have been an opportunity to dismantle racial barriers and celebrate two outstanding high school programs was instead turned into a racialized, divisive news cycle,” Moncree-Moffett wrote.
“The city is better when we lift up our students – not when we let others tear them down,” she added.
Lifting up the CPS high school students was a standout agenda item at Monday night’s meeting.
Several board members directed their kudos to the Taft students, urging them to “walk with your head held high,” as member Mary Wineberg said.
“CPS, this board, this district loves you. And we stand with you proudly as a shield of protection for you,” Moncree-Moffett said to close out the night’s remarks.
This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: After historic season, Pureval proclaims Nov. 24 ‘Taft Football Day’
Reporting by Grace Tucker, Cincinnati Enquirer / Cincinnati Enquirer
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
